THE        WORKS        OF 

rHEOPHILE    GAUTIER 

IN    TWENTY-FOUR    VOLUMES 
LIMITED     EDITION 


c 


IMITED,  FOR  SALE  IN  AMERICA, 
TO  ONE  THOUSAND  NUMBERED 
AND  REGISTERED  SETS,  OF  WHICH 
THIS  IS  NUMBER 4/:.4A.fc.... 


4, 

THE     WORKS      OF 

$    THEOPHILE 

?  G4UTIER 


VOLUME  SIX 


TRANSLATED    AND     EDITED     BY 
PROFESSOR  F    C.   DE  SUMICHRAST 

Department  of  French,  Harvard  University 


± 

^PORTRAITS 
OF  THE   DAY 

With    an    Introduction    by     the    Editor 


tj^  NEW  YORK  •   Published  for  Subscribers  only  rit 

ty  GEORGE  D.  SPROUL  -  MZ)  CCCC7 


Copyright,   /par,   by 
GEORGE  D.  SPROUL 


•  * 


UNIVERSITY    PRESS     •    JOHN    WILSON 
AND    SON     •    CAMBRIDGE.    U.S.A. 


Contents 


INTRODUCTION Page     3 

BERANGER "   ,    9   ^  f 

HONORE  DE  BALZAC "      16 

HENRY  MURGER t'XI38 

CHARLES  BAUDELAIRE "    148  xXf,* 

ALPHONSE  DE  LAMARTINE "    156  ^      i  ' 

ALFRED  DE  VIGNY       ...          "    171 

CHATTERTON "175 

PAUL  DE  KOCK 'SaSy 

JULES  DE  GONCOURT "    198 

JULES  JANIN "    208 

TONY  JOHANNOT ««    218 

INGRES "    225 

PAUL  DELAROCHE "    241 

ARY  SCHEFFER ««    258 

HORACE  VERNET "    269 

EUGENE  DELACROIX "•  279 

HIPPOLYTE  FLANDRIN "    284 

GAVARNI "5(288 

DAVID  D' ANGERS ««    308 

MADEMOISELLE  FANNY  ELSSLER       .     .     .     .     .     .  "318 

MADEMOISELLE  GEORGES "    323 

MADEMOISELLE  SUZANNE  BROHAN «    326 

MADAME  DORVAL "    332 

MADEMOISELLE  RACHEL "    337 


M38222 


List  of  Illustrations 

DEATH  OF  THE  DUKE  DE  GUISE.     By  Paul  Delaroche 

Frontispiece 

BALZAC'S  BIRTHPLACE  IN  TOURS Page     24 

ROGER  DELIVERING  ANGELICA.     By  Ingres  .      .      .      "     225 

FANNY  ELSSLER,   IN    THE  ROLE   OF    MATHILDE,  IN 

"THE  PIRATES"      . "318 


Portraits    of  the    Day 


PORTRAITS 
OF  THE 


Introduction 


Y^~         "^HE  present  volume  consists  of  a  number  of 

articles  upon  prose  writers,  poets,  painters, 

actresses,    and    dancers,    contributed     by 

Gautier   to    various    periodicals,    reviews, 

and    magazines  —  le    Figaro,    la    Presse,    le    Moniteur 

universel,    le     'Journal     OJpciel,     la    Gazette    de    Paris, 

V Artiste  —  between  the  years   1837  and  1871.     Many 

of  them  were  originally  of  greater  length,  but  were 

abridged  when  collected  in  book  form  and  republished 

in  1874. 

The  variety  of  talents  which  Gautier  criticises  in 
these  articles  has  had  the  advantage  of  bringing  out  the 
breadth  and  generosity  of  his  judgments.  Devoted  to 
the  worship  and  pursuit  of  art,  he  is  intensely  sympa- 
thetic towards  all  who  cultivate  it.  No  better  recom- 
mendation to  his  favour  could  be  had  than  love  for 
poetry,  painting,  or  sculpture.  He  can  understand  that 


************************ 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

men  should  hold  views  differing  widely  from  his  own ; 
that  they  should  delight  in  subjects  to  which  he  is 
personally  indifferent ;  that  some  should  prefer  line  to 
colour,  or  colour  to  line ;  Greek  art  to  Gothic,  the 
East  to  the  West,  modern  France  to  ancient  Rome. 
He  does  not  wish,  he  does  not  expect  all  to  conform 
to  his  views,  to  have  the  same  ideal.  He  has  praise 
for  Ingres  as  for  Delacroix,  for  the  spiritual-minded 
Lamartine  as  for  the  sensual  Baudelaire.  This,  be  it 
noted,  without  yielding  up  what  he  believes,  what  he 
is  convinced  is  the  only  true  mode  of  comprehending 
art  and  of  reproducing  beauty.  He  is  broad-minded, 
kind-hearted,  sympathetic  ;  he  is  willing,  nay,  desirous 
to  encourage.  He  seeks  for  merits  rather  than  defects ; 
he  is  anxious  not  to  allow  his  prepossessions  or  his 
prejudices  to  interfere  with  his  judgment ;  he  is  genu- 
inely glad  to  discover  reasons  for  praising  artists  whose 
work,  on  the  whole,  does  not  commend  itself  to  him  — 
but  he  will  not  sacrifice  his  essential  beliefs,  and  if  he 
cannot  agree  with  all  that  he  reads,  hears,  or  sees,  he 
will  say  so  plainly.  He  marks  the  limitations  of 
painter,  poet,  or  sculptor;  he  indicates  the  dangerous 
tendencies,  the  false  notions,  the  mistaken  practice. 
Ingres  has  his  share  of  demerit,  as  Delaroche  has  his 


INTRODUCTION 


portion  of  reproach  ;  and  on  the  other  hand  Vernet  is 
praised  and  Balzac  lauded,  even  though  the  former  is 
utterly  modern  and  never  roams  in  the  fairy  realms 
Gautier  revels  in,  and  the  latter  is  absolutely  unable  to 
understand  the  subtle  beauty  and  the  melodious  charm 
of  verse. 

Of  course,  Balzac  was  largely  a  Romanticist,  while 
Gautier  tended,  not  to  realism  exactly,  but  to  a  soberer 
mode  of  thought  and  to  a  firmer,  cleaner,  more  accurate 
form  of  expression  than  the  school  of  which  he  had 
been  so  illustrious  a  member,  and  which  was  being 
dethroned  in  its  turn  by  the  followers  of  Stendhal, 
Merimee,  and  Balzac.  Gautier  appreciated  the  admi- 
rable work  of  the  latter  at  a  time  when  praise  was  but 
grudgingly  conceded  to  one  of  the  greatest  masters  of 
French  letters.  The  realism  of  Balzac  did  not  shock 
him  ;  he  saw  in  the  stupendous  "  Comedie  humaine  " 
a  form  of  that  art  which  he  himself  loved  so  intensely 
and  so  faithfully. 

In  the  same  way  he  could  and  did  appreciate  so 
widely  different  a  genius  as  Lamartine,  who  appealed 
to  him  in  a  very  contrary  manner,  and  Alfred  de  Vigny, 
whose  reserve  and  aristocratic  pride  could  not  dampen 
the  critic's  enthusiasm  for  the  truly  noble  works  of  the 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

soldier-poet.  The  labours  of  Gavarni,  of  Johannot, 
appeared  to  him  worthy  of  laudation  and  notice ;  he 
conceived,  and  rightly,  that  his  business  as  a  critic  was 
to  draw  attention  to  talent  in  danger  of  being  forgotten, 
and  to  show  what  skill,  what  knowledge,  what  aptitude 
were  needed  to  produce  the  bright  illustrations  which 
day  after  day  gave  pleasure  to  thousands  of  Frenchmen 
and  foreigners. 

In  a  word,  the  reading  of  these  papers,  on  subjects 
so  varied,  on  talents  so  diverse,  has  the  effect  of  in- 
creasing admiration  for  Gautier  himself.  One  learns 
to  know  better  the  generous  heart  that  enjoyed  be- 
stowing praise,  and  the  upright  conscience  that  refused 
to  compromise  on  questions  of  principle.  And  wonder 
grows  as  Gautier's  own  style  changes  and  varies  ac- 
cording to  the  topic  ;  for  it  will  be  noted  that  the  style 
deepens  the  impression  made  by  the  thoughts,  and 
renders  the  work  criticised  more  real,  more  vivid  to  the 
reader. 

Finally,  the  volume  in  itself  recalls  a  brilliant  period 
in  the  past  century.  The  names  which  recur  in  the 
following  pages  were  household  words  in  very  truth; 
and  now  that  the  lapse  of  time  has  caused  some  to  be 
partly  forgotten  —  others,  perhaps,  to  sink  into  oblivion 


INTRODUCTION 


—  it  is  pleasant,  if  a  little  melancholy,  to  have  those 
figures  brought  back,  those  works  recalled,  those  days 
revived,  and  the  dazzling  triumphs,  the  heroic  struggles, 
the  fierce  contests  evoked  by  so  magic  a  pen  as 
Theophile  Gautier's. 


Portraits    of  the    Day 


BERANGER    • 


f  CHOUGH  he  still  lived  among  us  and  was 

saluted  with  respectful  glance  when  he 
was  met  walking,  he  was  no  longer  a  con- 
temporary. In  these  days  of  rapid  living, 
one  does  not  need  to  live  many  years  after  withdrawing 
from  the  battle,  in  order  to  be  able  to  estimate  one's 
reputation  from  the  point  of  view  of  later  generations. 
Beranger  had  the  satisfaction  of  knowing,  long  before 
going  down  to  the  grave,  what  posterity  would  think 
of  him,  and  of  passing  away  sure  of  his  immortality, 
if  indeed  such  an  ambition  had  arisen  within  his  heart. 
The  men  born  at  the  beginning  of  the  century,  or 
somewhat  earlier,  formed  the  immediate  public  of 
Beranger.  Those  who  belong  to  the  younger  genera- 
tion know  him  better  through  having  heard  his  songs 
sung  by  their  fathers  than  from  singing  them  them- 
selves; they  admire  him  somewhat  on  trust,  and 
because  of  vague  remembrances  of  their  childhood. 
This  circumstance  is  favourable  to  the  poet's  reputa- 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

tion  ;  his  claim  is  admitted,  it  is  no  longer  discussed, 
and  .the  ^general  meaning  of  his  work  stands  out 
niore  tfeariy. 

}  'B|raiig^r  co'nsoled  France  in  her  humiliation  ;  he 
preserved  and  revived  noble  remembrances,  and  in 
this  respect  he  truly  deserves  to  be  called  a  national 
poet ;  his  refrains  flew  on  sonorous  wings  from  lip  to 
lip,  and  many  know  them  who  never  read  his  work. 
No  man  was  more  popular,  and  in  this  he  obtained 
what  was  refused  to  greater  men  of  higher  position 
than  his  own. 

His  talent  consisted  in  enclosing  within  a  narrow 
framework  a  clear,  thoroughly  defined,  easily  under- 
stood thought,  and  in  expressing  it  in  a  simple  form. 
He  bore  in  mind  the  mass  of  the  uneducated,  whom 
French  poets  are  too  apt  to  forget,  and  who  are 
punished  for  their  disdain  by  a  limited  reputation. 
The  uneducated,  women,  the  common  people  rarely 
open  a  volume  of  verse;  they  fail  to  understand  lyrical 
descriptions,  complicated  rhythms,  and  learned  expres- 
sions. What  they  need  especially  is  a  legend,  a  short 
drama,  an  action,  a  feeling,  something  human  which 
they  are  capable  of  grasping.  Beranger  knew  how  to 
compose.  Even  his  poorest  songs  are  planned,  con- 

10 


BERANGER 


nected  ;  they  have  a  definite  aim  ;  they  begin,  continue, 
and  end  logically  ;  in  a  word,  they  have  a  framework 
like  a  vaudeville,  a  novel,  a  drama.  They  are  not  mere 
effusions,  poetic  caprices,  or  unconscious  harmonies. 

Having  settled  on  his  outline  and  strengthened  it, 
as  do  certain  painters,  Beranger  filled  it  in  and  coloured 
it,  sometimes  laboriously,  with  a  firm,  clean,  accurate 
touch,  without  any  great  warmth  of  tone,  and  in  that 
gray  tint  which  is,  as  it  were,  the  palette  of  French 
genius,  inimical,  in  all  the  arts,  to  excess,  violence,  and 
boldness.  Although  he  voluntarily  restricted  himself, 
and  often  with  difficulty,  to  a  genre  which  he  raised  to 
a  higher  level,  and  which,  up  to  his  time,  was  con- 
sidered inferior,  he  ever  cared,  like  a  true  artist,  for 
rhythm  and  rime,  without,  however,  making  them  dom- 
inant, as  is  the  case  with  certain  other  poets.  The 
rime  sound  in  his  work  is  always  full  and  round,  and 
almost  always  has  its  supporting  letter.  He  has  even 
often  hit  upon  rare  and  happy  rimes  in  this  way  which 
contain  surprises  and  satisfy  the  ear.  His  verse,  occa- 
sionally somewhat  clumsily  constructed,  and,  as  it  were, 
ill  at  ease  through  lack  of  space,  —  for  the  chanson 
does  not  admit  of  much  more  than  six  or  eight  coup- 
lets, the  lines  of  which  must  not  have  more  than  ten 

ii 


************************ 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

syllables,  forming  a  verse  in  itself  too  long  and  incon- 
veniently divided  for  singing,  —  is  generally  flowing 
and  well  constructed,  with  the  caesura  well  placed, 
and  infinitely  superior  to  contemporary  verse  until 
came  the  young  Romanticist  school  which  elaborated 
such  marvellous  rhythms.  But  although  he  was  lov- 
ingly patient  and  careful  in  execution,  polishing  and 
repolishing  in  order  to  efface  all  traces  of  joints,  he 
never  looked  upon  that  part  of  the  work  as  anything 
but  secondary.  He  subordinated  everything  to  his 
original  intention,  to  the  end  he  aimed  at  and  the 
effect  he  sought  to  produce.  Like  the  dramatic  author, 
who  cares  less  for  style  than  the  writer  properly  so- 
called,  he  had,  as  may  be  guessed,  to  cut  out  many 
charming  things  which  would  have  distracted  the  at- 
tention and  proved  tedious.  Few  poets  have  so  much 
courage  or  common-sense. 

Born  one  of  the  people,  Beranger  had  all  their 
instincts ;  he  naturally  understood  and  felt  their  joys, 
their  griefs,  their  regrets,  their  hopes,  and  thus  he  was 
thoroughly  modern.  He  did  not  look  for  his  subjects 
to  antiquity,  which  he  was  unacquainted  with  at  first, 
and  which  he  afterwards  affected  to  ignore.  Never 
having  learned  Latin,  he  ingeniously  turned  this  pre- 

12 


BERANGER 


text  to  account  in  order  not  to  write  a  patchwork  of 
Horace  and  Virgil.  At  a  time  when  imitation  was  all 
the  vogue,  he  thought  for  himself,  if  he  did  write  more 
like  other  men,  and  as  criticism  did  not  then  attach 
much  importance  to  songs,  he  did  not  suffer  from 
those  violent  attacks  which  other  budding  geniuses 
had  to  contend  with. 

France,  as  the  Revolution  of  1830  fully  proved, 
always  laid  the  blame  for  the  disasters  of  1815  at  the 
door  of  the  Restoration.  The  success  of  Beranger's 
political  songs  was  therefore  immense.  He  expressed 
with  rare  skill  the  general  feeling,  and  sang  aloud 
what  every  one  whispered  low  ;  he  spoke  of  the  Man 
of  Fate,  of  the  tricolour,  of  the  Old  Sergeant,  and  be- 
sides, enabled  the  French  to  make  fun  of  their  con- 
querors, —  a  service  which  that  brave,  proud,  and  witty 
people  never  forgets  ;  for  it  will  put  up  with  anything 
if  it  can  turn  its  enemy  into  ridicule. 

In  one  respect  Beranger  resembles  Charlet,  who  in 
his  line  of  art  also  wrought  out  the  familiar  epic  of  the 
Grand  Army,  and  represented  Napoleon  such  as  the 
people  had  seen  him,  with  his  small  hat  and  his  gray 
riding-coat.  The  poet  and  the  painter  accomplished 
something  which  it  is  very  difficult  to  manage  in  a 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE     DAY 

highly  civilised  country;  they  discovered  legend  in 
history,  and  they  drew  with  numberless  ineffaceable 
touches  a  silhouette  which  was  at  once  recognisable. 

These  are  doubtless  the  chief  reasons  of  the  great 
popularity  which  forever  attached  itself  to  Beranger's 
name ;  but  they  are  not  the  only  ones.  His  wit  is 
really  French,  even  Gallic,  without  any  foreign  mix- 
ture; that  is  to  say,  a  tempered,  playful,  humourous 
wit,  of  easy  morality,  of  Socratic  good-fellowship, 
something  between  that  of  Montaigne  and  Rabelais, 
the  latter  of  whom  laughs  more  willingly  than  he 
weeps,  and  yet  knows  when  to  temper  a  smile  with 
a  tear.  It  is  not  exactly  the  poetic  spirit,  such  as 
Goethe,  Schiller,  Byron,  Lamartine,  Victor  Hugo,  and 
Alfred  de  Musset  have  revealed  it  to  us ;  but  lyricism 
is  not  part  of  the  genius  of  our  nation.  Beranger 
pleases  the  greater  number,  outside  of  his  political 
opinions,  by  his  ingenious  clearness,  his  somewhat  bare 
sobriety,  and  his  proverbial  common-sense,  which,  so 
far  as  I  am  concerned,  come  too  close  to  prose.  I  am 
willing  that  the  Muse  should  walk,  especially  when  she 
wears  her  pretty  cothurns,  but  I  prefer  that  she  should 
fly  away,  even  at  the  cost  of  disappearing  in  the 
clouds. 


BERANGER 


There  is  in  Beranger's  work  a  large  number  of 
types  which  he  sketched  in  a  few  couplets,  and  which 
live  forever  with  that  vigorous  life  of  art  which  is 
much  more  lasting  than  real  life  :  the  King  of  Yvetot, 
Roger  Bontemps,  the  Marquis  of  Carabas,  the  Mar- 
chioness de  Pretintaille,  Mistress  Gregoire,  Fretillon, 
Lisette,  —  sparkling  etchings,  light  sketches,  pastels 
done  with  the  tip  of  the  finger,  which  are  worth  as 
much  as  the  most  finished  painting.  You  feel  that 
you  have  met  these  people  as  living  beings,  that  you 
have  spoken  to  them  and  that  they  have  replied. 


Portraits    of  the    Day 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

BORN  IN  1799  —  DIED  IN  1850 

I 

ABOUT  the  year  1835  I  was  living  in  two 
small  rooms  in  the  blind  lane  of  the  Doy- 
enne, nearly  on  the  spot  where  rises  to-day 
the  Pavilion  Mollien.  Although  situated  in  the  centre 
of  Paris  opposite  the  Tuileries,  within  a  couple  of  steps 
of  the  Louvre,  the  place  was  wild  and  deserted,  and  it 
certainly  took  persistence  to  discover  me  there.  Yet 
one  morning  I  saw  a  young  gentleman  with  high-bred 
manners,  with  a  cordial,  clever  look,  cross  my  thresh- 
old, and  apologise  for  introducing  himself.  It  was 
Jules  Sandeau.  He  had  come  from  Balzac  to  secure 
my  services  for  the  Chronique  de  Paris,  a  weekly  news- 
paper, which  some  of  my  readers  may  remember,  but 
which  was  not  financially  successful,  as  it  deserved  to 
be.  Balzac,  Sandeau  told  me,  had  read  "Mademoi- 
selle de  Maupin,"  then  recently  published,  and  he  had 
greatly  admired  the  author's  style.  He  therefore 

16 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

much  desired  to  secure  my  collaboration  for  the 
newspaper  which  he  backed  and  managed.  An  ap- 
pointment was  made,  and  from  that  day  began  be- 
tween us  a  friendship  which  death  alone  interrupted. 

I  mention  this,  not  because  it  is  flattering  to  me,  but 
because  it  does  honour  to  Balzac,  who,  famous  already, 
sent  for  an  obscure  young  writer  who  had  just  entered 
the  literary  field,  and  associated  him  in  his  work  on  a 
footing  of  perfect  comradeship  and  equality.  At  this 
time,  it  is  true,  Balzac  was  not  the  author  of  the 
"  Comedie  humaine,"  but  he  had  written,  besides  sev- 
eral tales,  the  "  Physiologic  du  Manage,"  the  u  Peau  de 
Chagrin,"  "  Louis  Lambert,"  "  Seraphita,"  "  Eugenie 
Grandet,"  the  «  Histoire  des  Treize,"  the  "  Medecin 
de  Campagne,"  and  "  Le  Pere  Goriot," — that  is  to 
say,  under  ordinary  circumstances,  enough  to  make 
five  or  six  men  famous.  His  rising  glory,  increasing 
from  month  to  month,  already  shone  with  all  the 
splendour  of  the  dawn ;  and  certainly  it  needed  great 
brilliancy  to  shine  in  a  heaven  where  showed  at  once 
Lamartine,  Victor  Hugo,  de  Vigny,  de  Musset,  Sainte- 
Beuve,  Alexandre  Dumas,  Merimee,  George  Sand,  and 
so  many  others.  But  Balzac  at  no  time  of  his  life 
posed  as  a  literary  Grand  Lama,  and  he  was  always  a 

17 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE     DAY 

kindly  companion.  He  was  proud,  but  was  absolutely 
devoid  of  conceit. 

At  that  time  he  lived  at  the  other  end  of  the 
Luxembourg,  near  the  Observatory,  in  an  unfrequented 
street  called  Cassini.  On  the  garden  wall  which  ran 
almost  all  the  way  down  the  side  on  which  stood  the 
house  inhabited  by  Balzac,  were  to  be  read  the  words, 
"  Absolute,  Dealer  in  Bricks."  This  curious  sign, 
which  still  exists,  unless  I  am  mistaken,  struck  him 
very  greatly.  It  is  possible  that  "  La  Recherche  de 
PAbsolu,"  sprang  from  this.  This  fateful  name  prob- 
ably suggested  to  the  author  Balthaser  Clae's  in 
pursuit  of  his  impossible  dream. 

When  I  saw  him  for  the  first  time,  Balzac,  who 
was  just  one  year  older  than  the  century,  was  about 
thirty-six,  and  his  face  was  one  of  those  that 
are  never  forgotten.  In  his  presence  one  recalled 
Shakespeare's  words  about  Caesar, — 

"  Nature  might  stand  up 
And  say  to  all  the  world,  «  This  was  a  man  !  *  " 

My  heart  beat  high,  for  I  had  never  approached 
without  trembling  a  master  of  thought,  and  all  the 
speeches  which  I  had  prepared  on  the  way  remained 
unspoken,  my  only  utterance  being  a  stupid  phrase, 


HQNORE    DE    BALZAC 

something  like  "  It  is  very  pleasant  to-day."  Balzac 
noted  my  embarrassment,  soon  put  me  at  my  ease, 
and  during  breakfast  I  regained  my  coolness  enough 
to  examine  him  carefully. 

He  wore  even  then  by  way  of  a  dressing-gown 
the  cashmere  or  white-flannel  gown  belted  in  by  a 
cord,  in  which  he  was  painted  somewhat  later  by 
Louis  Boulanger.  I  do  not  know  what  fancy  had  led 
him  to  choose  this  costume,  which  he  never  gave  up ; 
perhaps  in  his  eyes  it  was  symbolical  of  the  cloistered 
life  to  which  his  work  condemned  him,  and  like  a  true 
Benedictine  novelist,  he  had  taken  the  costume  of  the 
order.  Whatever  the  reason  may  have  been,  the  fact 
remains  that  the  white  gown  became  him  uncommonly 
well.  He  boasted,  as  he  showed  me  his  clean  sleeves, 
that  he  had  never  soiled  their  purity  with  the  least 
drop  of  ink,  "  for,"  said  he,  "  the  true  writer  must  be 
clean  while  at  work."  The  collar  of  the  gown, 
thrown  back,  showed  his  strong  bull-neck,  as  round 
as  a  pillar,  without  apparent  muscles,  and  of  a  satin- 
like  whiteness  which  contrasted  with  the  richer  com- 
plexion of  the  face.  At  this  time,  Balzac,  in  the 
prime  of  his  age,  exhibited  all  the  signs  of  robust 
health,  which  were  not  at  all  in  accord  with  the 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

fashionable  Romanticist  pallor  and  greenness ;  his  thor- 
ough-bred Touraine  blood  flushed  his  cheeks  with  a 
bright  purple  and  gave  a  warm  colour  to  his  kindly, 
thick,  sinuous  lips,  which  smiled  readily.  A  small 
moustache  and  a  tuft  accented  the  contours  without 
concealing  them.  The  nose,  ending  squarely,  divided 
into  two  lobes,  cut  with  well  opened  nostrils,  had  a 
strikingly  original  and  peculiar  appearance :  so  Balzac, 
when  he  was  posing  for  his  bust,  recommended  David 
d' Angers  to  take  care  of  the  nose, — "Take  care  of 
my  nose ;  my  nose  is  a  whole  world."  His  brow  was 
beautiful,  broad,  noble,  decidedly  whiter  than  the  rest 
of  the  face,  with  no  other  mark  than  a  furrow  per- 
pendicular to  the  root  of  the  nose.  The  bumps  of 
locality  stood  out  markedly  above  the  brows.  His 
abundant,  long,  black  hair  was  brushed  back  like  a 
lion's  mane.  As  for  his  eyes,  there  never  were  any 
like  them;  they  were  filled  with  intense  vitality,  light, 
and  magnetism.  In  spite  of  his  nightly  watches,  the 
eyeballs  were  as  pure,  limpid,  and  bluish  as  those  of 
a  child  or  a  maiden,  and  in  them  were  set  two  black 
diamonds  lighted  at  times  with  rich  golden  flashes. 
They  were  eyes  fit  to  make  eagles  lower  theirs,  fit  to 
read  through  walls  and  breasts,  to  still  the  maddened 

20 


HONORS     DE    BALZAC 

wild  beast,  —  the  eyes  of  a  king,  of  a  seer,  of  a 
tamer. 

Madame  Emile  de  Girardin,  in  her  novel  entitled 
"La  Canne  de  M.  de  Balzac,"  speaks  of  those  brilliant 
eyes :  "  Tancred  then  perceived  that  the  top  of  that 
club  was  studded  with  turquoises,  set  in  a  marvellously 
chased  gold  setting,  and  behind  it  he  saw  two  great 
black  eyes  more  brilliant  than  the  gems  themselves." 

As  soon  as  one  met  the  glance  of  these  extraor- 
dinary eyes,  it  became  impossible  to  notice  any  triv- 
iality or  irregularity  in  the  other  features. 

The  usual  expression  of  his  face  was  a  sort  of 
powerful  hilarity,  of  Rabelaisian  and  monkish  joy,  and 
no  doubt  the  gown  helped  to  suggest  the  thought  of 
Brother  Jean  des  Entommeures,  but  broadened  and 
elevated  by  a  mind  of  the  first  order. 

According  to  his  habit,  Balzac  had  risen  at  midnight 
and  had  worked  up  to  the  time  of  my  arrival.  His 
face  nevertheless  showed  no  fatigue,  save  a  darker  line 
under  the  eyes,  and  during  the  whole  breakfast  he  was 
madly  gay.  Little  by  little  the  conversation  turned  to 
literature ;  he  complained  of  the  frightful  difficulty  of 
the  French  language.  Style  preoccupied  him  greatly, 
and  he  sincerely  believed  he  did  not  possess  the  secret 

21 


*****  4;  4, 4,  £££4.  ££4:4;  4,4;  4,4,4;  £  44 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

of  it.  It  is  true  that  at  that  time  he  was  generally 
charged  with  lacking  style.  The  school  of  Hugo,  in 
love  with  the  sixteenth  century  and  the  Middle  Ages, 
learned  in  caesuras,  rhythms,  structures,  periods,  rich 
in  words  and  trained  to  write  good  prose  by  a  course 
in  the  gymnastics  of  verse,  working  besides  in  imitation 
of  a  master  whose  methods  were  assured,  cared  only 
for  what  was  well  written,  that  is,  wrought  out  and 
coloured  to  excess,  and,  besides,  considered  the  depict- 
ing of  modern  manners  useless,  low,  and  unlyrical.  So 
Balzac,  in  spite  of  the  reputation  which  he  began  to 
enjoy  with  the  public,  was  not  admitted  among  the 
gods  of  Romanticism,  and  he  knew  it.  While  his 
books  were  read  eagerly,  their  readers  did  not  consider 
their  serious  aspect,  and  even  to  his  admirers  he  long 
remained  "  the  most  fertile  of  our  romancers "  and 
nothing  else.  That  may  surprise  modern  readers,  but  I 
can  answer  for  the  accuracy  of  my  statement.  Balzac 
therefore  took  infinite  pains  to  acquire  style,  and  in  his 
anxiety  to  be  correct,  he  consulted  people  who  were 
immeasurably  inferior  to  him.  He  had,  he  said,  before 
signing  any  of  his  works,  written  about  a  hundred  vol- 
umes under  different  pseudonyms,  —  Horace  de  Saint- 
Aubin,  L.  de  Villergle,  etc.,  —  in  order  to  get  his 

22 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

liand  in ;  and  yet  he  did  possess  his  own  form, 
although  he  was  not  aware  of  it. 

But  let  us  return  to  the  breakfast.  While  talking, 
Balzac  played  with  his  knife,  and  I  noticed  his  hands, 
which  were  of  exquisite  beauty,  —  white,  with  well- 
shaped,  plump  fingers,  and  rosy,  shining  nails.  He 
was  rather  proud  of  them,  and  smiled  with  pleasure 
when  they  were  looked  at ;  they  gave  him  a  feeling  of 
high  birth  and  aristocracy.  Byron  says  in  a  note,  with 
evident  satisfaction,  that  Ali  Pacha  complimented  him 
upon  his  small  ears,  and  inferred  therefrom  that  he  was 
a  man  of  birth.  A  similar  remark  about  his  hands 
would  have  flattered  Balzac  as  much,  and  even  more 
than  praise  of  one  of  his  books.  He  went  so  far  as  to 
feel  a  sort  of  prejudice  against  those  whose  hands 
were  not  shapely. 

The  meal  was  rather  choice.  A  pate  de  fole  gras 
formed  part  of  it,  but  this  was  a  breach  of  his  usual 
frugality,  as  he  observed  laughingly ;  and  for  this  sol- 
emn occasion  he  had  borrowed  silverware  from  his 
publisher. 

I  withdrew,  after  having  promised  to  write  for  the 
Chronique  de  Paris^  in  which  appeared  the  "Tour 
en  Belgique,"  "  La  Morte  amoureuse,"  "  La  Chaine 

23 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

d'Or,"  and  other  literary  productions.  Charles  de 
Bernard,  also  invited  by  Balzac,  published  in  it  "  La 
Femme  de  quarante  ans,"  "  La  Rose  jaune,"  and  a 
few  tales  which  have  appeared  since  then  in  book 
form.  Balzac,  as  is  well  known,  had  invented  Woman 
at  Thirty;  his  imitator  had  added  ten  years  to  that 
already  venerable  age,  and  his  heroine  was  none  the 
less  successful. 

Before  we  proceed  farther,  let  me  stop  and  give  a 
few  details  of  Balzac's  life  before  I  became  acquainted 
with  him.  My  authorities  are  his  sister,  Madame  de 
Surville,  and  himself. 

Balzac  was  born  in  Tours  on  May  16,  1799,  on 
Saint  Honore's  day ;  hence  his  name,  which  sounded 
well  and  seemed  of  good  omen.  Little  Honore  was 
not  a  wonderful  child ;  he  did  not  prematurely  foretell 
that  he  would  write  the  "  Comedie  humaine."  He 
was  a  healthy,  blooming  boy,  fond  of  play,  with  bright, 
gentle  eyes,  but  in  no  wise  different  from  others  save 
when  looked  at  attentively.  At  seven  years  of  age,  on 
leaving  the  day  school  in  Tours,  he  was  sent  to  the 
College  de  Vendome  which  was  under  the  management 
of  the  Oratorians,  and  where  he  was  considered  a  very 
mediocre  pupil. 

24 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

The  first  part  of  "  Louis  Lambert  "  contains  interest- 
ing information  concerning  this  portion  of  Balzac's  life. 
Dividing  his  own  individuality,  he  has  represented 
himself  as  a  former  schoolmate  of  Louis  Lambert, 
speaking  sometimes  in  his  own  name  and  sometimes 
lending  his  own  sentiments  to  that  imaginary  yet  very 
real  personage,  which  is  a  sort  of  objective  represen- 
tation of  his  own  soul :  — 

"  Situated  in  the  centre  of  the  town,  on  the  small  river 
Loir  which  flows  at  the  foot  of  the  buildings,  the  college  forms 
a  broad  enclosure  in  which  are  contained  the  usual  buildings 
of  an  establishment  of  this  sort :  a  chapel,  a  theatre,  a  hospi- 
tal, a  bakery.  This  college,  the  most  celebrated  seat  of  learn- 
ing in  the  central  provinces,  draws  its  students  from  them  and 
the  colonies.  On  account  of  the  distance  parents  do  not  come 
very  often  to  visit  their  children.  Besides,  the  regulations  for- 
bid holidays  out  of  school.  Once  they  have  entered,  the 
students  remain  within  the  buildings  until  the  end  of  their 
studies.  With  the  sole  exception  of  the  walks  taken  outside 
of  the  walls  under  the  charge  of  the  Fathers,  everything  had 
been  arranged  to  give  to  this  establishment  the  advantages  of 
conventual  discipline.  In  my  day  the  corrector  was  still  a  liv- 
ing remembrance,  and  the  leathern  ferule  performed  its  dread 
work  most  creditably." 

Thus  does  Balzac  represent  that  formidable  school, 
which  left  lasting  remembrances  in  his  memory.  It 

25 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

would  be  interesting  to  compare  the  tale  called 
<c  William  Wilson,"  in  which  Edgar  Poe  describes, 
with  the  mysterious  enlargement  of  childhood,  the  old 
Elizabethan  building  in  which  his  hero  was  brought  up 
with  a  companion  no  less  strange  than  Louis  Lambert ; 
but  this  is  not  the  place  to  draw  the  parallel ;  I  am 
satisfied  with  suggesting  it. 

Balzac  suffered  terribly  in  that  college,  where  his 
dreamy  nature  was  oppressed  constantly  by  inflexible 
rules.  He  neglected  to  fulfil  his  duties,  but,  favoured 
by  the  tacit  complicity  of  a  tutor  in  mathematics,  who 
was  librarian  and  engaged  on  some  transcendental 
work,  he  did  not  take  his  lesson,  and  carried  off  such 
books  as  he  pleased.  His  whole  time  was  spent  in 
reading  in  secret.  Before  long,  therefore,  he  was  the 
best-punished  pupil  in  the  class.  Impositions  and 
keeping  in  soon  took  up  his  recreation  hours.  Punish- 
ment inspires  in  certain  boys  a  sort  of  stoical  feeling 
of  revolt,  and  they  exhibit  towards  their  exasperated 
teachers  the  same  disdainful  impassibility  as  the  captive 
savage  warrior  towards  the  enemies  who  torture  him ; 
neither  imprisonment,  deprivation  of  food,  nor  beatings 
can  draw  the  least  plaint  from  them.  Then  occur 
between  the  master  and  the  pupil  horrible  contentions 

26 


************************ 

HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

unknown  to  the  parents,  in  which  the  constancy  of  the 
martyr  equals  the  skill  of  the  torturer.  Some  nervous 
teachers  cannot  bear  the  look,  full  of  hatred,  contempt, 
and  threat,  with  which  a  boy  of  eight  or  ten  will  dare 
them. 

Let  me  bring  together  here  a  few  characteristic  de- 
tails which,  though  related  of  Louis  Lambert,  really 
apply  to  Balzac  :  — 

"  Accustomed  to  the  open  air  and  the  freedom  of  an  educa- 
tion left  to  chance,  caressed  by  the  tender  care  of  an  old  man 
who  cherished  him,  accustomed  to  think  in  bright  sunshine,  it 
was  very  difficult  for  him  to  bow  to  the  college  regulations,  to 
walk  in  file,  to  live  between  the  four  walls  of  a  room  in  which 
eighty  silent  lads  were  seated  on  wooden  benches,  each  before 
his  own  desk.  His  acuteness  of  feeling  was  exquisitely  deli- 
cate, and  he  suffered  in  every  part  of  his  being  from  this  life 
in  common.  The  odours  which  fouled  the  air,  mingling  with 
the  smell  of  a  class-room  always  dirty  and  filled  with  the 
remains  of  our  breakfasts  and  lunches,  told  upon  his  sense  of 
smell,  —  that  sense  which,  being  more  directly  related  than  the 
others  to  the  nervous  system  and  the  brain,  is  bound  to  cause 
by  its  impairment  invisible  harm  to  the  organs  of  thought. 
Besides  these  causes  of  atmospheric  corruption,  there  were  in 
the  study-rooms  lockers  in  which  each  boy  put  his  spoil  : 
pigeons  killed  for  feast-days,  or  food  surreptitiously  brought 
from  the  refectory.  Finally,  there  was  in  each  of  the  study- 

27 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

rooms  a  huge  stone  on  which  reposed  at  all  times  two  buckets 
full  of  water,  in  which  we  went  every  morning  in  turns  to  wash 
our  faces  and  hands  in  the  presence  of  a  master.  Cleansed 
once  a  day  only,  before  we  were  awake,  the  rooms  were 
always  filthy.  Then,  in  spite  of  the  number  of  windows  and 
the  door,  the  air  was  constantly  vitiated  by  the  emanations 
from  the  sink,  from  the  lockers,  by  the  numerous  industries  of 
each  pupil,  to  say  nothing  of  our  eighty  bodies  crowded 
together.  This  sort  of  humus  mingling  constantly  with 
the  mud  which  we  brought  in  from  the  courtyards,  formed 
a  filth  of  unbearable  odour.  The  privation  of  the  pure  and 
perfumed  air  of  the  country,  in  which  he  had  lived  until 
then,  the  change  in  his  habits,  the  discipline,  —  every- 
thing saddened  Lambert.  With  his  head  always  resting 
upon  his  left  hand  and  his  arm  leaning  upon  the  desk,  he 
passed  the  study-hours  in  looking  at  the  foliage  of  the  trees 
in  the  court  or  at  the  clouds  in  the  sky.  He  seemed  to  be 
studying  his  lessons,  but,  noting  his  pen  at  rest  or  his  page 
untouched,  the  teacher  would  cry  to  him,  *  You  are  not  work- 
ing, Lambert.'  J 

To  this  vivid,  accurate  painting  of  the  sufferings 
entailed  by  school  life,  let  me  add  that  other  passage  in 
which  Balzac,  speaking  of  his  dual  self  under  the 
double  name  of  Pythagoras  and  the  Poet,  —  the  one 
borne  by  that  half  of  himself  which  he  has  personified 
in  Louis  Lambert,  the  other  by  his  confessed  self, — 

28 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

admirably  explains  why  he  passed  for  a  dullard  in  the 
eyes  of  his  teachers  :  — 

"  Our  independence,  our  illicit  occupations,  our  apparent 
idleness,  the  state  of  numbness  in  which  we  remained,  our 
constant  punishments,  our  dislike  of  tasks  and  impositions, 
gained  for  us  the  reputation  of  being  cowardly  and  incorrigible 
children.  Our  masters  despised  us,  and  we  suffered  from  very 
dreadful  discredit  among  our  comrades,  from  whom  we  con- 
cealed our  forbidden  studies  through  fear  of  their  ridicule. 
This  double  contempt,  which  was  unjust  as  far  as  the  Fathers 
were  concerned,  was  natural  enough  in  our  comrades.  We 
could  neither  play  ball,  run,  nor  walk  on  stilts  in  times  of 
amnesty,  when  by  chance  we  obtained  a  moment's  freedom  ; 
we  shared  none  of  the  pleasures  in  vogue  in  the  school ;  we 
were  strangers  to  the  enjoyments  of  our  comrades.  We  re- 
mained alone,  sadly  seated  under  a  tree  in  the  yard.  So  the 
Poet  and  Pythagoras  formed  an  exception,  a  life  outside  the 
ordinary  life.  The  penetrating  instinct,  the  delicate  self-love 
of  schoolboys,  made  them  feel  that  these  were  loftier  or  lower 
minds  than  theirs ;  hence  arose  in  some  a  hatred  of  our  mute 
aristocracy,  in  others  contempt  for  our  uselessness.  We  were 
not  conscious  of  this  state  of  feelings,  and  it  may  be  that  I  have 
only  made  it  out  now.  So  we  lived  exactly  like  two  rats,  in 
the  corner  of  the  room  where  were  our  desks,  and  where  we 
had  to  stay  both  during  hours  of  study  and  of  play." 

The  result  of  the  secret  work,  of  the  meditations 
which  took  up  the  time  for  study,  was  that  famous 

29 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

"  Treatise  on  the  Will  "  which  is  mentioned  several 
times  in  the  "  Comedie  humaine."  Balzac  always 
regretted  the  loss  of  that  first  work,  which  he  has 
briefly  summarised  in  u  Louis  Lambert."  And  he 
relates,  with  an  emotion  which  time  has  not  lessened, 
the  confiscation  of  the  box  in  which  the  precious 
manuscript  was  enclosed.  Jealous  comrades  endeav- 
oured to  snatch  the  box  from  the  two  friends,  who 
were  defending  it  ardently. 

"  Suddenly  attracted  by  the  noise  of  the  fight,  Father  Hau- 
goult  intervened  abruptly  and  asked  what  the  dispute  was 
about.  The  terrible  Haugoult  ordered  us  to  give  him  the  box. 
Lambert  handed  him  the  key ;  he  took  out  the  papers,  glanced 
at  them,  and  then  said  as  he  confiscated  them,  « So  that  is  the 
nonsense  for  which  you  neglect  your  duty ! '  Great  tears  fell 
from  Lambert's  eyes,  drawn  from  him  as  much  by  the  con- 
sciousness of  his  wounded  moral  superiority  as  by  the  gratui- 
tous insult  and  the  treachery  which  had  befallen  us.  Father 
Haugoult  probably  sold  to  a  grocer  of  Vendome  the  '  Treatise 
on  the  Will/  without  knowing  the  importance  of  the  scientific 
treasures,  the  still-born  germs  of  which  were  lost  in  ignorant 
hands/' 

After  this  narration,  he  adds,  — 

"  It  was  in  memory  of  the  catastrophe  which  happened  to 
Louis'  book  that,  in  the  work  with  which  these  studies  begin, 

3° 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

I  have  used  for  a  fictitious  work  the  title  really  invented  by 
Louis  Lambert,  and  that  I  have  given  the  name,  Pauline,  of  a 
woman  whom  he  loved  to  a  young  girl  full  of  devotion. " 

And,  indeed,  on  opening  the  "  Peau  de  Chagrin," 
there  is  found  in  Raphael's  confession  the  following 
sentences :  — 

"  You  alone  admired  my  '  Theory  of  the  Will,'  that  long 
work  in  preparation  for  which  I  had  studied  Oriental  lan- 
guages, anatomy,  and  physiology;  to  which  I  devoted  the 
greater  part  of  my  time ;  the  work  which,  unless  I  am  mis- 
taken, will  complete  the  labours  of  Mesmer,  Lavater,  Gall,  and 
Bichat,  and  open  a  new  road  to  human  science.  With  it  stops 
my  beautiful  life  and  that  daily  sacrifice,  that  continuous  labour 
unknown  to  the  world,  the  sole  recompense  of  which  lies  per- 
haps in  the  work  itself.  Since  I  came  to  years  of  discretion 
until  the  day  when  I  finished  my  '  Theory,'  I  observed, 
learned,  wrote,  read  unceasingly,  and  my  life  was,  as  it  were, 
one  long  imposition.  An  effeminate  lover  of  Oriental  idleness, 
attached  to  my  dreams,  sensually  inclined,  I  have  worked  un- 
ceasingly, denying  myself  the  enjoyments  of  Parisian  life  ;  a 
gourmand,  I  have  been  sober  ;  although  I  love  walking,  and 
travelling  by  sea,  although  I  longed  to  visit  foreign  countries, 
although  I  delight  even  now  in  making  ducks  and  drakes  like  a 
child,  I  have  remained  constantly  at  my  desk,  pen  in  hand  ; 
fond  of  conversation,  I  have  gone  to  listen  silently  to  the  pro- 
fessors in  the  public  courses  at  the  Library  and  the  Museum  ; 

31 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

I  have  slept  on  my  solitary  couch  like  a  Benedictine  monk, 
and  yet  woman  was  my  only  chimera,  —  a  chimera  which  I 
caressed  and  which  ever  fled  from  me." 

If  Balzac  regretted  the  "  Treatise  on  the  Will,"  he 
must  have  felt  a  good  deal  less  the  loss  of  his  epic 
poem  on  the  Incas,  which  began  thus  : 

"  O  Inca,  O  unfortunate,  unhappy  king," 

an  ill-timed  inspiration  which  gained  for  him,  as  long 
as  he  remained  at  school,  the  nickname  of  poet.  Bal- 
zac, it  must  be  owned,  never  had  the  gift  of  poetry,  or 
at  least,  of  versification.  His  very  complex  thought 
was  always  rebellious  to  rhythm. 

The  result  of  this  intense  meditation,  of  these  men- 
tal efforts,  truly  prodigious  in  a  child  of  twelve  or  four- 
teen, was  a  strange  illness,  a  nervous  fever,  a  sort  of 
state  of  coma,  utterly  unintelligible  to  the  teachers, 
who  were  not  aware  of  the  secret  reading  and  work  of 
the  young  Honore,  apparently  idle  and  stupid.  No 
one  in  the  school  suspected  his  precocious  excess  of 
intelligence,  or  knew  that  in  the  school  prison,  to 
which  he  had  himself  condemned  daily  in  order  to  be 
free,  the  supposedly  idle  scholar  had  absorbed  a  whole 
library  of  serious  books  far  above  his  powers  at  that 

32 


************************ 

HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

age.  Let  me  here  introduce  a  few  interesting  passages 
about  the  power  of  reading  attributed  to  Louis  Lam- 
bert, that  is,  of  course,  Balzac  :  — 

"  In  three  years'  time  Louis  Lambert  had  assimilated  the 
substance  of  the  books  in  his  uncle's  library  which  were  worth 
reading.  The  absorption  of  ideas  through  reading  had  become 
in  him  a  curious  phenomenon.  His  eye  took  in  seven  or  eight 
lines  at  a  glance,  and  his  mind  caught  the  sense  with  a  speed 
comparable  to  that  of  his  glance.  Often  even  a  single  word 
sufficed  to  enable  him  to  draw  out  the  meaning  of  a  whole  sen- 
tence. His  memory  was  prodigious.  He  remembered  with 
equal  accuracy  thoughts  acquired  by  reading  and  thoughts  sug- 
gested to  him  by  reflection  or  conversation.  He  possessed 
every  form  of  memory,  —  for  places,  names,  words,  things, 
faces.  Not  only  could  he  recall  objects  at  will,  but  he  saw 
them  in  his  mind  lighted  up  and  coloured  as  they  were  at  the 
moment  when  he  had  perceived  them.  That  power  applied 
equally  to  the  most  elusive  acts  of  the  understanding.  He 
remembered,  to  use  his  own  expression,  not  only  where  lay 
thoughts  in  the  book  from  which  he  had  taken  them,  but  also 
the  state  of  his  soul  at  distant  times." 

Balzac  preserved  that  marvellous  gift  of  his  youth 
throughout  his  life,  and  increased  it.  It  explains  the 
extent  of  his  work,  which  is  as  great  as  the  labours  of 
Hercules. 

The  frightened  teachers  wrote  to  Balzac's  parents  to 

3  33 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

come  and  fetch  him  with  all  speed.  His  mother 
hastened  to  him  and  took  him  home  to  Tours.  Great 
was  the  astonishment  of  the  family  when  they  beheld 
the  thin,  wretched  child  which  the  school  sent  back, 
instead  of  the  cherub  which  it  had  received,  and 
Honore's  grandmother  noticed  it  with  pain.  Not  only 
had  he  lost  his  fine  complexion  and  his  plumpness ;  he 
seemed,  owing  to  a  congestion  of  ideas,  to  have  become 
imbecile.  His  attitude  was  that  of  an  ecstatic  or  of  a 
somnambulist  asleep  with  his  eyes  wide-open,  lost  in 
deep  reverie ;  he  did  not  hear  what  was  said  to  him,  or 
his  thoughts,  having  wandered  away,  returned  too  late 
for  him  to  reply.  But  open  air,  rest,  the  affectionate 
environment  of  the  family,  the  distractions  which  he 
was  forced  to  indulge  in,  and  the  energetic  vigour  of 
youth  soon  triumphed  over  this  sickly  state.  The 
tumultuous  buzz  of  ideas  in  his  brain  gradually  died 
down ;  his  miscellaneous  reading  gradually  became 
classified ;  real  images,  observations  made  silently  upon 
actuality,  mingled  with  his  abstractions.  While  walk- 
ing or  playing,  he  studied  the  fair  landscape  of  the 
Loire,  the  provincial  types,  the  cathedral  of  Saint- 
Gatien,  and  the  characteristic  faces  of  priests  and 
canons.  Several  sketches  which  were  turned  to  ac- 

34 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

count  later  in  the  great  fresco  of  the  "  Comedie  "  were 
certainly  drawn  during  this  period  of  fruitful  inaction. 
Nevertheless,  the  family,  no  more  than  the  school, 
divined  or  understood  Balzac's  intelligence.  Indeed, 
if  anything  ingenious  escaped  him,  his  mother,  who 
nevertheless  was  a  superior  woman,  would  say  to  him, 
"  I  fancy,  Honore,  you  do  not  understand  what  you 
are  saying/'  And  Balzac  would  laugh,  without  ex- 
plaining himself.  His  father,  who  had  something  of 
Montaigne,  of  Rabelais,  and  of  Uncle  Toby  in  his 
philosophy,  his  eccentricity,  and  his  kindness  (it  is 
Mme.  de  Surville  who  speaks),  had  a  rather  better 
opinion  of  his  son,  on  account  of  certain  genetic 
systems  which  he  had  invented  and  which  led  him  to 
the  conclusion  that  a  child  of  his  could  not  possibly  be 
a  fool.  He  did  not,  however,  in  the  smallest  degree, 
suspect  that  the  boy  would  in  the  future  be  a  great 
man. 

Balzac's  family  having  returned  to  Paris,  he  was 
sent  to  the  boarding-school  of  M.  Lepitre  in  the  rue 
Saint-Louis,  and  then  to  that  of  Messieurs  Scanzer  and 
Beuzelin,  in  the  rue  Thorigny  at  the  Marais.  There, 
as  at  the  Vendome  school,  his  genius  did  not  manifest 
itself,  and  he  remained  confounded  amid  the  herd  of 

35 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

ordinary  pupils.     No  enthusiastic  usher  said    to  him, 
Tit  Marcellus  eris,  or  Sic  itur  ad  astra. 

Having  finished  his  school  education,  Balzac  gave 
himself  that  second  education  which  is  the  true  one. 
He  studied,  perfected  himself,  attended  the  courses  at 
the  Sorbonne,  and  studied  law  while  working  in  the 
office  of  a  solicitor  and  notary.  Although  this  was 
apparently  a  waste  of  time,  since  Balzac  did  not  be- 
come a  solicitor,  a  notary,  or  a  judge,  it  was  neverthe- 
less of  value  to  him,  for  it  made  him  acquainted  with 
legal  people,  and  enabled  him  to  write  later,  in  a  way  to 
amaze  professional  men,  what  may  be  called  the  legal 
side  of  the  "  Comedie  humaine." 

Having  passed  his  examinations,  the  great  question 
of  the  career  to  be  followed  presented  itself.  His 
people  wanted  Balzac  to  become  a  notary,  but  the 
future  great  writer,  who  was  conscious  of  his  genius, 
though  no  one  believed  in  it,  refused  most  respectfully, 
although  he  had  the  opportunity  to  enter  an  office  on 
most  favourable  conditions.  His  father  gave  him  a 
couple  of  years  to  show  what  he  could  do,  and  as  the 
family  was  returning  to  the  provinces,  Mme.  Balzac 
installed  Honore  in  a  garret,  giving  him  an  allow- 
ance scarcely  sufficient  for  the  barest  needs,  and 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

hoping  that  a  taste  of  privations  would  make  him 
wiser. 

That  attic  was  in  the  rue  de  Lesdiguieres,  near  the 
Arsenal,  the  library  of  which  offered  its  resources  to 
the  young  student.  No  doubt,  to  pass  from  a  home  in 
which  he  enjoyed  abundance  and  luxury  to  a  wretched 
garret  would  be  hard  at  any  other  time  of  life  than 
twenty-one,  which  was  Balzac's  age ;  but  if  the  dream 
of  every  child  is  to  wear  boots,  that  of  every  young 
man  is  to  have  a  room,  a  room  of  his  own,  of  which  he 
has  the  key  in  his  pocket,  even  if  the  room  be  only 
large  enough  for  him  to  stand  upright  in  the  middle. 
A  room  is  the  virile  toga,  is  independence,  individuality, 
and  love. 

So  here  is  Master  Honore,  perched  aloft,  seated 
before  his  table,  starting  to  write  the  masterpiece  which 
was  to  justify  his  father's  indulgence  and  to  give  the 
lie  to  the  unfavourable  predictions  of  his  friends.  It  is 
a  singular  thing  that  Balzac  began  with  a  tragedy,  with 
Cromwell  for  its  subject.  Just  about  that  time  Victor 
Hugo  was  completing  his  "  Cromwell,"  the  preface  of 
which  became  the  manifesto  of  the  young  dramatic 
school. 


37 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

II 

FOR  any  one  who  knew  Balzac  intimately  and  who 
reads  attentively  the  "  Comedie  humaine,"  it  contains, 
especially  in  his  earlier  works,  many  interesting  details 
of  his  character  and  of  his  life,  when  he  had  not  quite 
yet  got  rid  of  his  own  individuality,  and  for  want  of 
subjects  observed  and  dissected  himself.  I  have  said 
that  he  began  the  hard  novitiate  of  the  literary  life  in  a 
garret  of  the  rue  de  Lesdiguieres,  near  the  Arsenal. 
The  tale  "  Facino  Cane,"  dated  Paris,  March,  1836, 
and  dedicated  to  Louise,  contains  some  valuable  infor- 
mation of  the  life  which  the  young  aspirant  to  glory 
led  in  his  aerial  nest :  — 

"I  was  then  living  in  a  street  which  you  probably  do 
not  know,  the  rue  de  Lesdiguieres.  It  begins  at  the  rue 
Saint-Antoine,  opposite  a  fountain,  near  the  Place  de  la 
Bastille,  and  ends  in  the  rue  de  la  Cerisaie.  The  love  of 
learning  had  cast  me  into  a  garret,  where  I  worked  during  the 
night,  while  I  spent  the  day  in  a  neighbouring  library,  —  that 
of  Monsieur  (the  King's  brother).  I  lived  frugally;  I  con- 
formed to  the  conditions  of  that  monastic  life  which  is  so 
necessary  to  the  worker.  When  the  weather  was  fine,  I 
occasionally  took  a  walk  on  the  Boulevard  Bourdon.  A  single 
passion  could  draw  me  from  my  studious  habits,  but  was  not 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

that  passion  also  a  study  ?  I  would  go  to  observe  the  manners 
of  the  Faubourg,  its  inhabitants  and  their  characters.  As 
badly  dressed  as  the  workmen,  indifferent  to  decorum,  they 
did  not  mistrust  me  ;  I  could  mingle  with  their  groups,  I 
could  go  and  watch  them  bargaining  and  disputing  at  the  time 
when  they  left  off  work.  Observation  had  already  become 
intuitive  with  me  ;  it  penetrated  the  soul  without  neglecting 
the  body,  —  or  rather,  it  grasped  external  details  so  thoroughly 
that  at  once  it  went  beyond  them.  It  gave  me  the  power  to 
live  the  life  of  the  individual  upon  which  I  practised  it,  by 
enabling  me  to  take  his  place,  as  the  Dervish  in  the  '  Thou- 
sand and  One  Nights  *  took  the  body  and  soul  of  people  over 
whom  he  uttered  certain  words.  When  between  eleven  and 
midnight  I  met  a  workman  and  his  wife  returning  together 
from  the  Ambigu-Comique  Theatre,  I  would  amuse  myself 
following  them  from  the  Boulevard  du  Pont-aux-Choux  to  the 
Boulevard  Beaumarchais.  These  good  people  talked  first  of 
the  play  which  they  had  seen  ;  then  from  one  thing  to 
another,  they  got  to  their  business.  The  mother  pulled  the 
child  by  the  hand  without  listening  to  its  plaints  or  its  requests. 
The  pair  reckoned  up  the  money  which  would  be  paid  them 
the  next  day  ;  they  spent  it  in  twenty  different  ways  ;  then 
would  come  household  details,  grumblings  at  the  excessive 
price  of  potatoes,  or  at  the  length  of  the  winter  and  the  in- 
creasing cost  of  living,  energetic  remonstrances  about  what 
was  due  the  baker,  and  finally  discussions  which  grew  bitter 
and  in  which  each  exhibited  his  or  her  character  in  picturesque 

39 


************************ 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

expression.  As  I  listened  to  these  people,  I  could  adopt  their 
life,  I  felt  their  clothes  on  my  back,  I  walked  in  their  shoes 
full  of  holes.  Their  desires,  their  needs,  everything,  passed 
into  my  soul,  and  my  soul  passed  into  theirs  ;  it  was  the 
dream  of  a  man  wide-awake.  I  got  hot  with  them  against  the 
foreman  who  tyrannised  over  them,  or  against  the  bad-paying 
client  who  made  them  return  several  days  without  settling  up. 
To  abandon  my  own  habits,  to  become  another  self  by  the 
intoxication  of  moral  faculties,  to  play  the  game  out,  —  such 
was  my  enjoyment.  To  what  do  I  owe  this  gift,  this  second 
sight  ?  Is  it  one  of  those  qualities  the  abuse  of  which  would 
lead  to  madness  ?  I  have  never  inquired  into  the  source  of 
this  power  ;  I  possess  it  and  use  it,  that  is  all." 

I  have  transcribed  these  lines,  doubly  interesting  be- 
cause they  illumine  a  little-known  side  of  Balzac's  life, 
and  exhibit  in  him  the  consciousness  of  that  powerful  in- 
tuitive faculty  without  which  the  completion  of  his  work 
would  have  been  impossible.  Balzac,  like  Vishnu,  the 
Indian  god,  possessed  the  gift  of  avatar,  that  is,  of  in- 
carnating himself  in  different  bodies  and  of  living  as 
long  as  he  pleased  in  them.  Only,  the  number  of 
Vishnu's  avatars  is  fixed  at  ten  ;  the  avatars  of  Balzac 
are  innumerable,  and  besides  he  could  produce  them  at 
will.  Strange  as  it  may  seem  to  us  in  this  nineteenth 
century  of  ours,  Balzac  was  a  seer  ;  his  gift  of  observa- 

40 


HONOR E    DE    BALZAC 

tion,  his  physiological  perspicuity,  his  literary  genius  do 
not  suffice  to  explain  the  infinite  variety  of  the  two  or 
three  thousand  types  which  play  a  more  or  less  im- 
portant part  in  the  "  Comedie  humaine."  He  did  not 
copy  them,  he  lived  them  in  his  mind,  he  put  on  their 
dress,  he  assumed  their  habits,  he  entered  their  sur- 
roundings, he  was  themselves  as  long  as  necessary. 
Hence  these  consistent,  logical  beings  which  never 
contradict  themselves,  which  are  endowed  with  such 
a  deep,  genuine  life,  which  —  to  make  use  of  one  of 
his  expressions  —  compete  with  the  official  records  of 
men's  lives.  Real  red  blood  flows  in  their  veins,  in- 
stead of  the  ink  which  ordinary  authors  introduce  into 
their  creations.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  Balzac  pos- 
sessed that  faculty  in  regard  to  the  present  only.  He 
could  transport  himself  in  thought  into  the  marquis, 
the  financier,  the  bourgeois,  the  man  of  the  people,  the 
courtesan,  but  the  shades  of  the  past  did  not  answer 
his  call.  He  never  was  able,  like  Goethe,  to  evoke 
Fair  Helen  from  the  depths  of  antiquity  and  make  her 
dwell  within  Faust's  Gothic  manor.  With  two  or 
three  exceptions,  his  whole  work  is  modern.  He 
assimilated  the  living;  he  could  not  resuscitate  the 
dead.  History  itself  tempted  him  but  little,  as  may 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

be   seen  by  a   paragraph   in    the  Introduction    to  the 
u  Comedie  humaine:  —  " 

"As  one  reads  the  dry  and  dull  nomenclatures  of  facts 
called  histories,  who  is  there  that  does  not  perceive  that  writ- 
ers in  Egypt,  in  Persia,  in  Greece,  at  Rome,  have  always  for- 
gotten to  give  us  the  history  of  manners  ?  The  passage  of 
Petronius  about  the  private  life  of  the  Romans  irritates  rather 
than  satisfies  our  curiosity." 

The  blank  left  by  the  historians  of  vanished  socie- 
ties, Balzac  proposed  to  fill  up  as  far  as  ours  was  con- 
cerned ;  and  every  one  knows  how  faithfully  he  carried 
out  the  programme  which  he  had  laid  out  for  himself: 

"  Society  was  to  be  the  historian,  I  the  secretary  merely. 
By  drawing  up  the  inventory  of  vices  and  virtues,  by  collecting 
the  principal  facts  of  passions,  by  depicting  characters,  select- 
ing the  chief  features  in  society,  composing  types  by  combin- 
ing the  traits  of  several  homogeneous  characters,  I  might 
perhaps  manage  to  write  a  history  forgotten  by  so  many 
historians,  —  that  of  manners.  With  much  patience  and 
courage  I  might  compose  about  France  in  the  nineteenth 
century  the  book  which  we  all  regret,  which  Rome,  Venice, 
Tyre,  Memphis,  Persia,  India,  have  unfortunately  not  left  us 
concerning  their  civilisations,  and  which,  in  imitation  of  the 
Abbe  Barthelemy,  the  courageous  and  patient  Monteil  tried  to 
write  about  the  Middle  Ages,  but  in  a  not  very  attractive 
form." 

42 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

Let  us  return  to  the  garret  of  the  rue  de  Lesdi- 
guieres.  Balzac  had  not  yet  thought  out  the  plan  of 
the  work  which  was  to  immortalise  him.  He  was  still 
seeking  his  way  uneasily,  laboriously,  with  much  effort, 
trying  everything,  succeeding  in  nothing ;  yet  he 
already  possessed  that  obstinacy  of  work  to  which 
Minerva,  however  rebellious  she  may  prove,  is  bound 
to  yield  to  some  day  or  another.  He  sketched  comic 
operas,  drew  up  plans  of  dramas  and  novels,  of  which 
Mme.  de  Surville  has  preserved  the  titles  for  us : 
"  Stella,"  "  Coqsigrue,"  "  Les  deux  Philosophies," 
to  say  nothing  of  the  terrible  "Cromwell,"  the  lines 
of  which  cost  htm  so  much  trouble,  and  were  not 
much  better  than  the  line  with  which  began  his  epic 
poem  on  the  Incas. 

Imagine  young  Honore,  his  legs  wrapped  up  in  a 
patched  carrick,  the  upper  portion  of  his  body  protected 
by  an  old  shawl  of  his  mother's,  on  his  head  a  sort  of 
Dante-like  cap,  of  which  Mme.  Balzac  alone  possessed 
the  pattern,  his  coffee-pot  on  his  left,  his  ink-bottle  on  his 
right,  ploughing  away  with  bowed  brow,  like  an  ox  at 
the  plough,  the  stony  and  untouched  field  of  thought  in 
which  later  he  cut  such  fruitful  furrows.  His  lamp 
shone  like  a  star  in  the  darkened  house,  the  snow  fell 

43 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

silently  on  the  tiles,  the  wind  blew  through  the  door  and 
window,  "  like  Julou  in  his  flute,  but  less  agreeably." 

If  any  belated  passer-by  had  looked  up  to  that 
obstinately  flickering  little  light,  he  would  certainly  not 
have  suspected  that  it  was  the  dawn  of  one  of  the 
greatest  glories  of  our  age.  Here  is  a  sketch  of  the 
place,  transposed,  it  is  true,  but  very  accurate,  drawn 
by  the  author  himself  in  the  "  Peau  de  Chagrin,"  the 
work  in  which  he  has  put  so  much  of  himself :  — 

"A  room  which  looked  out  upon  the  yards  of  the  neigh- 
bouring houses,  from  the  windows  of  which  stuck  out  long 
poles  covered  with  clothes.  Nothing  could  be  more  hideous 
than  that  garret  with  its  dirty,  yellow  walls,  that  smelled  of 
wretchedness  and  called  for  a  scholar.  The  roof  sloped  down 
evenly,  and  the  disjointed  tiles  allowed  the  sky  to  be  seen. 
There  was  room  enough  for  a  table,  a  few  chairs,  and  under 
the  gable  of  the  roof  I  could  put  my  piano.  I  lived  in  that 
aerial  sepulchre  for  nearly  three  years,  working  night  and  day, 
without  stop  or  stay,  with  so  much  pleasure  that  study  seemed 
to  me  the  most  beautiful  thing,  the  successful  solution  of  human 
life.  The  calm  and  silence  which  a  scholar  needs  have  a 
sweetness  and  an  intoxication  comparable  to  that  of  love. 
Study  lends  a  sort  of  magic  to  all  that  surrounds  us.  The 
mean  desk  on  which  I  wrote  and  the  brown  stuff  which  cov- 
ered it,  my  piano,  my  bed,  my  armchair,  the  quaint  design 
of  the  paper  on  the  wall,  my  furniture,  all  these  things  became 

44 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

living  and  humble  friends  of  mine,  the  silent  helpers  of  my 
future.  How  many  a  time  have  I  not  put  my  soul  into  them 
as  I  gazed  upon  them  ?  As  my  eyes  wandered  along  the 
broken  moulding,  I  would  come  upon  new  ideas,  upon  a  proof 
of  my  system,  or  words  which  I  thought  happily  rendered 
inexpressible  ideas." 

In  the  same  passage  he  alludes  to  his  work  :  — 

"  I  had  undertaken  an  important  piece  of  work,  a  play, 
which  was  very  shortly  to  bring  me  renown,  wealth,  and 
entrance  into  that  world  in  which  I  proposed  to  satisfy  myself 
in  the  practice  of  the  royal  rights  of  a  man  of  genius.  You  all 
took  that  masterpiece  for  the  first  mistake  of  a  young  fellow 
who  had  just  left  college,  a  child's  folly.  Your  jokes  killed 
fruitful  lines  which  have  never  again  reappeared." 

We  recognise  here  the  unfortunate  "  Cromwell," 
which,  having  been  read  to  the  family  and  its  friends 
in  solemn  assembly,  proved  a  complete  failure. 
Honore  appealed  from  that  sentence  to  an  arbiter 
whom  he  accepted  as  competent,  a  kind  old  man, 
formerly  a  professor  in  the  Polytechnic  School.  The 
verdict  was  that  the  author  had  better  try  anything  at 
all  except  literature.  What  a  loss  for  letters,  what 
a  blank  in  the  human  mind,  if  the  young  man  had 
bowed  to  the  experience  of  his  elder  and  taken  his 
advice  !  Yet  it  certainly  was  very  sound,  for  there 

45 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

was  not  the  least  spark  of  genius,  or  even  talent, 
visible  in  that  rhetorical  tragedy. 

Happily,  Balzac,  under  the  pseudonym  of  Louis 
Lambert,  had  not  written  in  vain  the  "Theory  of 
the  Will "  at  the  College  of  Vendome.  He  accepted 
the  verdict,  but  merely  as  regarded  tragedy.  He 
understood  that  he  must  not  hope  to  walk  in  the  foot- 
steps of  Corneille  and  Racine,  whom  he  then  admired 
on  trust,  for  never  were  there  geniuses  more  different 
from  his  own.  The  novel  offered  him  a  more  con- 
venient mould,  and  he  wrote  at  that  time  a  great 
number  of  books  which  he  did  not  sign  and  which 
he  always  disavowed.  The  Balzac  whom  we  know 
and  admire  was  still  in  limbo,  and  was  vainly  striving 
to  emerge.  Those  who  considered  him  fit  to  be  a 
clerk  only  were  apparently  right,  but  perhaps  even 
that  resource  would  have  failed  him,  for  his  fine  hand 
must  have  already  been  spoiled  by  the  writing  of  the 
crumpled,  scratched,  re-written,  almost  hieroglyphic 
drafts  of  the  writer  struggling  with  his  idea  and  utterly 
careless  of  the  form  of  his  letters. 

So  nothing  had  come  from  that  rigorous  claustration, 
from  that  hermit  life  in  the  Thebaid  of  which  Raphael 
gives  us  the  budget  :  — 

46 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

««  Three  sous'  worth  of  bread,  two  sous'  worth  of  milk,  and 
three  sous'  worth  of  pork  meat  kept  me  from  starvation,  and 
maintained  my  brain  in  a  state  of  singular  lucidity.  My 
lodging  cost  me  three  sous  a  day  ;  I  burned  three  sous'  worth 
of  oil  a  night ;  I  made  my  own  room  and  wore  flannel  shirts 
in  order  not  to  spend  more  than  two  sous  a  day  at  the 
laundry.  I  warmed  my  room  with  coal,  the  price  of  which, 
divided  by  the  number  of  days  in  the  year,  never  amounted 
to  more  than  two  sous  a  day.  I  had  clothes,  linen,  and  shoes 
enough  to  last  me  three  years ;  I  made  up  my  mind  to  dress 
only  when  I  went  to  certain  public  lectures  and  to  the  libra- 
ries. My  total  expenses  amounted  to  eighteen  sous,  — that 
left  me  two  sous  for  unforeseen  matters.  I  do  not  remember, 
during  that  long  period  of  work,  crossing  the  Pont  des  Arts 
or  purchasing  any  water." 

No  doubt  Raphael  somewhat  exaggerates  the  econ- 
omy, but  Balzac's  letters  to  his  sister  show  that  the 
novel  is  not  very  far  from  the  truth.  The  old  woman 
who  figures  under  the  title  of  Iris  the  Messenger,  and 
who  was  seventy,  could  not  be  a  very  active  house- 
keeper, so  we  find  Balzac  writing  :  — 

"The  news  from  my  household  is  disastrous.  Work 
interferes  with  cleanliness.  That  rascal  Ego  is  more  and 
more  neglectful  of  himself.  He  goes  out  every  three  or  four 
days  for  purchases,  goes  to  the  nearest  and  least  well  stocked 
shops  in  the  neighbourhood ;  the  others  are  too  far,  and  my 

47 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

lad  at  least  saves  shoe  leather.  So  that  your  brother,  who  is 
destined  to  become  so  famous,  is  fed  exactly  like  a  great  man, 
that  is,  he  is  starving. 

"  Another  misfortune  is  that  the  coffee  makes  dreadful  stains 
on  the  floor.  It  takes  a  great  deal  of  water  to  repair  the 
damage.  Now  as  water  does  not  come  up  to  my  heavenly 
garret,  —  it  only  comes  down  to  it  in  rain  storms,  —  I  shall 
have  to  think,  after  purchasing  the  piano,  of  setting  up  a 
hydraulic  machine,  if  my  coffee  continues  to  leak  while  master 
and  servant  are  gaping." 

Elsewhere,  keeping  up  the  joke,  he  scolds  the  lazy 
Ego,  who  leaves  cobwebs  hanging  from  the  ceiling, 
flocks  of  dirt  blowing  under  the  bed,  and  a  blinding 
dust  covering  the  windows.  In  another  letter  he  says, 
ic  I  have  eaten  two  melons.  I  shall  make  up  for 
this  by  eating  nuts  and  dry  bread." 

One  of  the  few  enjoyments  he  allowed  himself  was 
to  go  to  the  Botanical  Garden  or  to  the  cemetery  of 
Pere-Lachaise.  From  the  summit  of  the  cemetery 
hill  he  overlooked  Paris,  as  did  de  Rastignac  at  the 
funeral  of  old  Goriot.  His  eye  ranged  over  the  sea 
of  slates  and  tiles  which  concealed  so  much  luxury,  so 
much  misery,  so  many  intrigues,  so  many  passions. 
Like  a  young  eagle,  he  gazed  upon  his  prey,  but  he 
had  yet  neither  wings  nor  beak  nor  talons,  although 


HONQRE     DE     BALZAC 

his  eye  could  look  straight  at  the  sun.  He  used  to 
say,  as  he  looked  at  the  tombs :  "  There  are  no  fine 
epitaphs  save  these,  —  La  Fontaine,  Massenet,  Moliere, 
—  a  single  name  which  tells  everything  and  which 
makes  you  think." 

Those  words  were  inspired  by  a  vague,  prophetic 
presentiment,  which,  alas !  was  realised  too  soon. 
On  the  slope  of  the  hill,  upon  a  tombstone  below  a 
bronze  bust  modelled  after  the  marble  bust  by  David, 
the  single  word  u  Balzac  "  tells  everything  and  makes 
the  solitary  stroller  reflect. 

The  dietetic  regimen  recommended  by  Raphael 
might  favour  lucidity  of  the  brain,  but  certainly  it 
was  very  bad  for  a  young  man  accustomed  to  a  com- 
fortable family  life.  Fifteen  months  spent  under  these 
intellectual  leads,  more  gloomy,  unquestionably,  than 
the  leads  of  Venice,  had  turned  the  fresh-coloured 
youth  from  Tours,  with  his  satiny,  bright  cheeks, 
into  a  pale,  yellow  Parisian  skeleton,  almost  unrecog- 
nisable. Balzac  returned  to  his  father's  home,  where 
the  fatted  calf  was  killed  for  the  return  of  that  most 
unprodigal  son. 

I  shall  pass  rapidly  over  that  part  of  his  life  during 
which  he  endeavoured  to  secure  independence  by  spec- 

4  49 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

ulating  in  the  publishing  business  ;  the  lack  of  capital 
alone  preventing  his  being  successful.  His  attempt 
got  him  into  debt,  mortgaged  his  future,  and,  in  spite 
of  the  earnest  but  perhaps  somewhat  dilatory  help  of 
his  family,  weighed  him  down  with  that  rock  of 
Sisyphus  which  he  pushed  so  often  up  to  the  edge 
of  the  plateau,  and  which  ever  fell  back  crushingly 
upon  his  Atlas-like  shoulders,  that  bore  the  whole 
world  besides.  His  debts,  which  he  considered  it 
a  sacred  duty  to  pay,  for  they  represented  the  for- 
tune of  people  who  were  dear  to  him,  proved  to  be 
Necessity  with  her  knotted  whip,  with  her  hand  full 
of  bronze  nails,  that  worried  him  night  and  day  with- 
out stay,  and  made  him  look  upon  an  hour's  rest  or 
distraction  as  a  theft.  It  weighed  painfully  upon  his 
whole  life,  and  often  made  it  unintelligible  to  any  one 
not  in  the  secret.  And  now  these  indispensable  bio- 
graphical details  have  been  given,  let  me  come  to  my 
direct  and  personal  impressions  of  Balzac. 

Balzac,  with  his  mighty  brain,  Balzac,  who  was  so 
penetrating  a  physiologist,  so  close  an  observer,  Balzac, 
who  had  so  much  intuition,  did  not  possess  the  literary 
gift.  In  him  there  was  a  great  gulf  fixed  between 
thought  and  its  expression.  In  his  earlier  days  he 

50 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

despaired  of  ever  crossing  it.  He  threw  into  it,  with- 
out ever  filling  it  up,  volume  after  volume,  night- 
watch  after  night-watch,  essay  after  essay ;  a  whole 
library  full  of  disowned  books  went  into  it.  A  man 
of  less  determined  will  would  have  been  discouraged 
over  and  over  again,  but  happily  Balzac  had  an  un- 
shakable trust  in  his  genius,  as  yet  unrecognised.  He 
had  resolved  to  become  a  great  man,  and  he  became 
one  by  incessantly  projecting  that  fluid  more  powerful 
than  electricity,  which  he  has  so  subtly  analysed  in 
u  Louis  Lambert."  In  contradistinction  to  the  writers 
of  the  Romanticist  School,  who  were  all  noted  for 
amazing  completeness  and  fertility  of  execution,  and 
who  brought  forth  their  fruits  almost  at  the  same  time 
as  their  flowers,  the  bloom  being,  as  it  were,  almost 
involuntary  with  them,  Balzac,  who  equalled  them  all 
as  a  genius,  could  not  find  a  way  to  express  himself, 
or  rather  found  it  only  after  infinite  trouble.  Hugo 
said  in  one  of  his  prefaces,  with  that  Castilian  pride 
of  his,  "  I  do  not  possess  the  art  of  putting  a  beauty 
in  the  place  of  a  defect,  and  I  correct  myself  in 
another  work."  But  Balzac  covered  with  erasures  as 
many  as  ten  different  proofs,  and  when  he  saw  me 
send  back  to  the  Chronique  de  Paris  the  proof  of  an 

51 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

article  written  straight  off  on  the  corner  of  a  table 
without  any  more  than  typographical  corrections,  he 
could  not  believe,  however  pleased  with  it  he  might 
otherwise  be,  that  I  had  put  all  my  talent  into  it. 
"  If  you  had  worked  it  over  two  or  three  times  more, 
it  would  have  been  better,"  he  would  say. 

Setting  himself  up  as  an  example,  he  would  preach 
to  me  the  strangest  literary  hygiene.  I  ought  to  shut 
myself  up  for  two  or  three  years,  drink  water,  and  eat 
lupins  as  did  Protogenes;  go  to  bed  at  six  in  the 
evening,  rise  at  midnight,  and  work  until  morning; 
spend  the  day  in  revising,  extending,  cutting  down, 
perfecting,  polishing  the  work  of  the  night  before, 
correcting  the  proofs,  taking  notes,  making  the  neces- 
sary studies,  and  especially  live  in  the  most  absolutely 
chaste  manner.  He  insisted  at  great  length  on  this 
last  recommendation,  —  a  harsh  one  for  a  young  man 
of  twenty-four  or  twenty-five.  In  his  opinion,  real 
chastity  developed  the  natural  powers  in  the  highest 
degree,  and  gave  to  those  who  practised  it  unsuspected 
power.  I  objected  timidly  that  the  greatest  geniuses 
had  not  forbidden  themselves  love  or  passion,  or  even 
pleasure,  and  I  would  cite  illustrious  names.  Balzac 
would  shake  his  head  and  answer,  "  They  would  have 

52 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

done  far  greater  things  if  they  had  kept  away  from 
women." 

The  single  concession  that  he  would  allow,  and 
regretfully  at  that,  was  a  half-hour's  interview  with 
the  beloved  person  each  year.  He  allowed  letters,  — 
"they  formed  the  style." 

He  promised,  if  I  would  subject  myself  to  this 
regimen,  to  make  of  me,  with  the  natural  talent  which 
he  was  good  enough  to  accord  me,  a  writer  of  the  first 
rank.  It  will  readily  be  seen  by  my  work  that  I  have 
not  followed  that  very  wise  plan  of  study. 

It  must  not  be  imagined  that  Balzac  was  joking 
when  laying  down  a  rule  which  Trappists  and  Car- 
thusians would  have  thought  hard ;  he  was  truly  con- 
vinced, and  spoke  with  such  eloquence  that  I  several 
times  conscientiously  tried  this  method  of  acquiring 
genius.  I  rose  several  times  at  midnight,  and  after 
having  drunk  the  inspiring  coffee,  brewed  in  accord- 
ance with  the  formula,  I  sat  down  before  my  table, 
on  which  sleep  very  soon  bowed  my  head.  The 
"  Morte  amoureuse,"  published  in  the  Chronique  de 
Paris,  was  my  single  nocturnal  work. 

At  about  this  time  Balzac  had  written  for  a  review 
"  Facino  Cane,"  the  story  of  a  Venetian  noble  who, 

53 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

imprisoned  in  the  dungeons  of  the  Ducal  Palace,  had 
fallen  by  accident  into  the  secret  treasury  of  the 
Republic,  a  large  portion  of  which  he  had  carried  off 
with  the  assistance  of  a  jailer  he  had  bribed.  Facino 
Cane,  who  had  become  blind,  and  who  played  the 
clarinet  under  the  vulgar  name  of  Father  Canet,  had 
preserved  in  spite  of  his  infirmity  a  second  sight,  so 
far  as  gold  was  concerned.  He  could  divine  its  exist- 
ence through  walls  and  vaults,  and  he  offered  the 
author  at  a  wedding  in  the  Faubourg  Saint-Antoine 
to  guide  him,  if  he  would  pay  his  travelling  expenses, 
to  that  vast  mass  of  riches  of  which  the  fall  of  the 
Venetian  Republic  had  caused  the  location  to  be  for- 
gotten. Balzac,  as  I  have  said,  lived  in  his  characters, 
and  at  that  moment  he  was  Facino  Cane  himself,  bar 
blindness,  for  never  did  more  brilliant  eyes  flash  in 
a  human  face.  So  he  was  dreaming  only  of  barrels 
of  gold,  of  heaps  of  diamonds  and  carbuncles,  and  by 
means  of  magnetism,  with  which  he  had  long  been 
familiar,  he  made  somnambulists  seek  out  the  place 
of  buried  and  lost  treasure.  He  claimed  to  have  thus 
learned,  in  the  most  accurate  manner,  the  spot  where, 
near  the  mountain  of  Pointe-a-Pitre,  Toussaint  1'Ouver- 
ture  had  buried  his  gold  with  the  help  of  negroes  who 

54 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

were  at  once  shot  down.  Poe's  "  Gold  Bug "  does 
not  come  up  in  cleverness  of  induction,  in  clearness 
of  plan,  in  the  divination  of  details,  to  the  feverish 
recital  which  he  made  to  me  of  the  expedition  to  be 
attempted  in  order  to  become  possessors  of  this  treas- 
ure, which  was  far  richer  than  that  buried  by  Kidd  at 
the  foot  of  the  tulip  tree  with  the  death's  head. 

I  beg  the  reader  not  to  laugh  at  me  if  I  humbly 
confess  that  I  soon  shared  Balzac's  belief.  What 
brain  could  have  resisted  his  amazing  speech  ?  Jules 
Sandeau  also  was  soon  seduced,  and  as  two  sure 
friends,  two  devoted,  robust  comrades  were  needed 
to  dig  at  night  on  the  spot  indicated  by  the  somnam- 
bulists, Balzac  was  kind  enough  to  give  each  of  us 
a  fourth  share  of  that  prodigious  wealth.  One  half 
was  to  be  his,  however,  by  right,  as  the  discoverer  and 
director  of  the  undertaking. 

We  were  to  purchase  pickaxes,  crowbars,  and 
shovels,  to  embark  them  secretly  on  board  a  ship,  to 
reach  the  place  indicated  by  different  ways  so  as  not 
to  excite  suspicion,  and  having  managed  the  business, 
to  ship  our  riches  on  a  barque  chartered  beforehand. 
In  a  word,  it  was  a  perfect  novel,  which  would  have 
teen  wonderful  if  Balzac  had  only  written  it  instead 

55 


************************ 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

of  speaking  it.  Needless  to  say,  we  did  not  dig  up 
Toussaint  1'Ouverture's  treasure,  for  we  had  not  the 
money  to  pay  for  our  passage,  there  being  scarcely 
enough  between  the  three  of  us  to  buy  the  pickaxes. 
The  dream  of  sudden  wealth,  due  to  some  strange  and 
marvellous  cause,  often  haunted  Balzac's  brain.  A 
few  years  before  (in  1833)  he  had  made  a  trip  to 
Sardinia  to  examine  the  refuse  of  the  silver  mines 
abandoned  by  the  Romans,  which,  having  been  treated 
by  imperfect  processes,  must  still,  in  his  opinion, 
contain  a  great  deal  of  metal.  The  idea  was  sound, 
and,  imprudently  imparted  by  him,  made  another 
man's  fortune. 

Ill 

I  HAVE  related  the  anecdote  of  Toussaint  1'Ouverture's 
buried  treasure,  not  for  the  pleasure  of  relating  an 
amusing  story,  but  because  it  is  connected  with  the 
master-thought  of  Balzac,  —  money.  Assuredly  no 
one  was  less  mercenary  than  the  author  of  the 
"  Comedie  humaine,"  but  his  genius  made  him  foresee 
the  mighty  part  which  this  metallic  hero  was  to  play 
in  art,  —  a  hero  more  interesting  to  modern  society  than 
the  Grandisons,  the  Des  Grieux,  the  Oswalds,  the 

56 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

Werthers,  the  Malek-Adhels,  the  Renes,  Laras,  Wa- 
verleys,  Quentin  Durwards,  and  others.  Up  to  this 
time  novelists  had  been  content  to  depict  a  single  pas- 
sion, that  of  love,  but  love  in  an  ideal  sphere,  beyond 
the  necessities  and  the  small  wants  of  life.  The  char- 
acters in  these  wholly  psychological  tales  neither  ate, 
drank,  nor  lodged  anywhere ;  they  had  no  account  with 
their  tailor ;  they  lived,  moved,  and  had  their  being  in 
an  environment  as  abstract  as  that  of  tragedy.  If  they 
proposed  to  travel,  they  took  no  passport,  but  put  a  few 
handfuls  of  diamonds  into  their  pocket  and  paid  in  that 
currency  postilions  who  never  failed  to  founder  their 
horses  at  every  relay.  Mansions  of  vague  architecture 
received  them  at  the  end  of  their  travel,  and  they  wrote 
with  their  blood  interminable  letters,  dated  from  the 
Northern  Tower,  to  their  loves.  The  heroines,  no  less 
immaterial,  resembled  Angelica  KaufFman's  aqua-tintas. 
They  wore  great  straw  hats,  hair  curled  in  English 
fashion,  and  long  dresses  of  white  muslin  bound  at 
the  waist  with  a  blue  scarf. 

His  deep  feeling  for  reality  made  Balzac  understand 
that  the  modern  life  he  desired  to  depict  was  domi- 
nated by  one  great  fact,  —  money ;  and  in  the  "  Peau 
de  Chagrin  "  he  was  courageous  enough  to  represent  a 

57       ' 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

lover  anxious  not  only  to  know  whether  he  has  touched 
the  heart  of  the  woman  he  loves,  but  also  whether  he 
will  have  money  enough  to  pay  the  cab  in  which  he  is 
taking  her  home.  This  is  perhaps  the  greatest  boldness 
which  any  man  has  allowed  himself  in  literature,  and  it 
would  alone  suffice  to  make  Balzac  immortal.  The 
amazement  it  created  was  profound,  and  purists  grew 
wroth  at  this  infraction  of  the  laws  of  the  novel ;  but 
all  the  young  fellows  who,  going  to  spend  an  evening 
with  a  lady,  wore  white  gloves  which  had  been  cleaned 
with  rubber,  had  traversed  Paris  like  dancers  on  the 
tips  of  their  shoes  and  feared  a  splash  of  mud  more 
than  a  pistol  shot,  sympathised,  because  they  had  felt 
it,  with  the  anguish  of  Valentin,  and  were  doubly  in- 
terested in  the  hat  which  he  cannot  replace  and  which 
he  preserves  with  solicitous  care.  At  times  of  greatest 
want,  the  discovery  of  one  of  the  five-franc  pieces 
slipped  between  the  papers  in  the  drawer  by  the 
modest  sympathy  of  Pauline  produced  the  effect  of  the 
most  romantic,  startling  situation  on  the  stage,  or  of 
the  intervention  of  a  Peri  in  Arabian  tales.  Who  is 
there  that  has  not  discovered  in  a  day  of  distress,  for- 
gotten in  his  trousers  pocket  or  in  a  vest,  a  noble 
crown-piece  which  turned  up  exactly  at  the  right  time 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

and  saved  one  from  the  misfortune  which  a  youth 
most  dreads,  —  the  inability,  when  with  the  woman  he 
loves,  to  pay  for  a  carriage,  a  bouquet,  a  footstool,  a 
theatre  programme,  to  tip  the  box-opener,  or  some  such 
trifle? 

Balzac,  besides,  excels  in  depicting  youth,  poor  as  it 
almost  always  is,  engaged  in  its  first  struggle  with  life, 
a  prey  to  the  temptations  of  pleasure  and  luxury,  but 
bearing  up  under  great  poverty,  thanks  to  its  high 
hopes.  Valentin,  Rastignac,  Bianchon,  d'Arthez,  Lu- 
cien  de  Rubempre,  Lousteau,  have  all  eaten  the  hard 
bread  of  poverty,  —  a  strengthening  food  for  a  robust 
stomach,  but  indigestible  for  weak  ones.  Balzac  does 
not  lodge  all  those  handsome  young  fellows  with- 
out a  sou  in  conventional  garrets  hung  with  chintz, 
with  windows  festooned  with  sweet  peas  and  looking 
out  upon  gardens ;  he  does  not  make  them  eat  "  simple 
dishes  prepared  by  the  hands  of  nature ;  "  he  does  not 
clothe  them  in  plain  but  convenient  garments.  He 
puts  them  into  a  common  boarding-house,  such  as 
Mother  Vauquer's,  or  sticks  them  under  the  arch  of  a 
roof,  makes  them  lean  on  the  greasy  tables  of  the 
meanest  eating-houses,  clothes  them  in  black  coats 
with  whitened  seams,  and  is  not  afraid  to  send  them  to 

59 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

the    pawn-shop    if  they    still   possess  —  which   is   not 
usual,  —  their  father's  watch. 

O  Corinne,  you  who  on  Cape  Miseno  let  your 
snow-white  arm  hang  upon  your  ivory  lyre  while  the 
son  of  Albion,  draped  in  a  splendid  new  cloak  and 
wearing  boots  beautifully  polished,  contemplates  and 
listens  to  you  in  an  elegant  attitude,  —  what  would  you, 
Corinne,  have  said  of  such  heroes  ?  Yet  they  possess 
a  quality  which  Oswald  lacks,  —  they  live  a  life  so  real 
that  one  feels  as  if  one  had  met  them  many  a  time. 
No  wonder,  then,  that  Pauline,  Delphine  de  Nucingen, 
the  Princess  de  Cadignan,  Madame  de  Bargeton, 
Coralie,  Esther  are  madly  in  love  with  them. 

At  the  time  when  the  first  novels  signed  by  Balzac 
appeared,  people  did  not  long  for  —  or  rather,  fever- 
ishly covet  —  gold  as  they  do  now.  California  was  yet 
to  be  discovered ;  there  scarcely  existed  more  than  a 
few  miles  of  railways ;  the  future  development  of  this 
form  of  transportation  was  not  foreseen,  and  railways 
were  looked  upon  as  something  like  slides  which  were 
to  take  the  place  of  the  switchbacks,  that  had  fallen 
into  desuetude.  The  public  was,  so  to  speak,  ignorant 
of  what  is  now  called  business,  and  bankers  alone 
speculated  on  'Change.  The  turning  over  of  capital, 

60 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

the  stream  of  gold,  the  calculations,  the  arithmetic,  the 
importance  given  to  money  in  works  which  were  even 
then  accepted  as  merely  romantic  fictions,  and  not  as 
serious  paintings  of  life,  greatly  astounded  subscribers 
to  circulating  libraries,  and  critics  summed  up  the 
amounts  expended  or  staked  by  the  author.  The  mil- 
lions of  Father  Grandet  gave  rise  to  arithmetical  dis- 
cussions, and  serious  people,  moved  by  the  enormous 
totals,  doubted  the  financial  capacity  of  Balzac,  —  a 
very  remarkable  capacity,  nevertheless,  as  was  later 
recognised.  Stendhal  said,  with  a  sort  of  disdainful 
conceit  of  style,  "  Before  writing  I  always  read  three 
or  four  pages  of  the  Civil  Code  to  get  my  tone." 
Balzac,  who  understood  money  so  well,  also  discovered 
poems  and  dramas  in  the  Code.  The  u  Contrat  de 
Manage,"  in  which  he  contrasts,  under  the  characters 
of  Matthias  and  Solonnet,  the  old  and  the  new  style  of 
lawyer,  is  as  interesting  as  the  most  exciting  comedy 
of  cloak  and  sword.  The  story  of  the  bankruptcy  in 
the  "Grandeur  et  Decadence  de  Cesar  Birotteau,"  is  as 
absorbing  as  the  narrative  of  the  fall  of  an  empire ;  the 
fight  between  the  castle  and  the  peasant's  hut  in  the 
"  Paysans,"  is  as  full  of  alternations  as  the  siege  of 
Troy.  Balzac  knows  how  to  impart  life  to  an  estate, 

61 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

to  a  house,  to  an  inheritance,  to  capital ;  he  makes 
them  into  heroes  and  heroines,  whose  adventures  are 
read  with  feverish  anxiety. 

These  elements  thus  newly  introduced  into  the 
novel  did  not  at  first  please  readers.  The  philosoph- 
ical analysis,  the  detailed  descriptions  of  characters,  the 
accounts  so  minute  that  they  seemed  meant  for  poster- 
ity, were  looked  upon  as  regrettably  diffuse,  and  usually 
were  skipped  by  the  reader  eager  to  reach  the  end  of 
the  story.  Later  on  it  was  seen  that  the  author's  main 
object  was  not  to  weave  more  or  less  complicated 
plots,  but  to  depict  the  whole  of  society  from  top  to 
bottom,  the  members  of  it,  and  their  abodes ;  then  the 
immense  variety  of  his  types  was  admired.  Was  it 
not  Alexandre  Dumas  who  said:  "Shakespeare,  the 
man  who,  next  to  God,  has  been  the  greatest  creator  "  ? 
This  would  be  far  more  correct  applied  to  Balzac,  for 
never  indeed  did  so  many  living  creatures  emerge  from 
a  human  brain. 

At  this  time  (1836)  Balzac  had  already  conceived 
the  plan  of  his  "  Comedie  humaine "  and  was  fully 
conscious  of  his  own  genius.  He  skilfully  connected 
the  works  which  had  already  appeared  with  his  general 
idea,  and  found  a  place  for  them  in  the  categories 


HONORS    DE    BALZAC 

which  he  made  up  systematically.  Some  purely  fanci- 
ful tales  are  unquestionably  not  in  full  harmony  with 
it,  in  spite  of  the  joinings  which  he  made  subsequently, 
but  these  details  are  lost  in  the  vastness  of  the  mass, 
like  architectural  remains  in  a  different  style  in  a 
splendid  edifice. 

I  have  said  that  Balzac  worked  with  difficulty,  and, 
determined  to  do  well,  would  throw  back  a  dozen 
times  into  the  crucible  the  metal  which  had  not  ac- 
curately filled  the  mould.  Like  Bernard  Palissy,  he 
would  have  burned  his  furniture,  the  floor,  and  even 
the  beams  of  his  house,  to  keep  up  the  fire  of  his 
furnace  so  that  the  experiment  should  not  fail.  The 
most  pressing  necessity  never  drove  him  to  allow  the 
publication  of  a  book  on  which  he  had  not  expended 
his  utmost  efforts,  and  he  repeatedly  gave  proof  of 
admirable  literary  conscientiousness.  His  corrections, 
so  numerous  that  they  almost  amounted  to  different 
editions  of  the  same  idea,  were  charged  against  him 
by  the  publishers,  whose  profits  were  absorbed  by 
them,  and  his  remuneration,  often  small  considering 
the  value  of  the  work  and  the  labour  it  had  cost  him, 
was  diminished  by  so  much.  The  promised  payments 
were  not  always  made  when  due,  and  in  order  to  meet 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

what  he  laughingly  called  his  floating  debt,  Balzac  dis- 
played prodigious  resources  of  mind  and  an  activity 
which  would  have  completely  filled  the  life  of  an 
ordinary  man.  But  when,  seated  before  his  table  in 
his  monk's  robe  in  the  silence  of  the  night,  he  found 
himself  with  white  leaves  on  which  fell  the  light  of 
his  seven  candles  concentrated  by  a  green  shade,  when 
he  took  up  the  pen,  he  forgot  everything,  and  then 
began  a  struggle  more  terrible  than  that  of  Jacob  with 
the  angel,  the  struggle  between  the  form  and  the  idea. 
In  these  nightly  battles  from  which  he  emerged  every 
morning  worn  but  victorious,  when  the  cold  hearth  on 
which  the  fire  had  gone  out  cooled  the  atmosphere  of 
the  room,  his  head  smoked  and  from  his  body  rose  a 
steam  as  visible  as  that  which  rises  from  the  bodies  of 
horses  in  winter.  Sometimes  a  single  phrase  took  up 
the  whole  night.  It  was  written,  re-written,  twisted, 
kneaded,  hammered,  lengthened,  shortened,  put  in  a 
hundred  different  ways,  and,  strange  to  say,  the  neces- 
sary, the  absolute  form  came  only  after  all  approximate 
forms  had  been  exhausted.  No  doubt  the  metal  flowed 
often  in  a  fuller,  richer  way,  but  there  are  very  few 
pages  in  Balzac's  works  which  remain  as  he  first 
wrote  them. 

64 


HQNORE    DE    BALZAC 

His  way  of  working  was  this :  When  he  had  a  long 
time  borne  and  lived  a  subject  within  himself,  he  jotted 
on  a  few  pages  in  a  rapid,  broken,  erratic,  almost 
hieroglyphic  hand  a  sort  of  scenario^  which  he  sent  to 
the  printer,  who  returned  the  pages  in  the  shape  of 
posters,  —  that  is,  of  single  galleys  in  the  centre  of 
large  sheets.  He  read  carefully  those  posters,  which 
already  gave  to  his  work  in  embryo  that  impersonal 
character  which  manuscript  does  not  possess,  and  he 
applied  to  this  first  sketch  the  powerful  critical  faculty 
he  possessed,  judging  his  own  writing  as  if  the  work 
were  another  man's.  He  had  something  to  work  on 
then,  he  approved  or  disapproved,  he  maintained  or  he 
corrected,  but  mostly  he  added.  Lines,  starting  from 
the  beginning,  the  middle  or  the  end  of  sentences, 
went  off  to  the  margin  on  the  right,  the  left,  the  top 
and  the  bottom,  leading  to  developments,  to  inter- 
calations, to  inserts,  to  epithets,  to  adverbs.  After  a 
few  hours'  work,  the  page  looked  like  a  final  burst  of 
fireworks  drawn  by  a  child.  From  the  original  text 
sprang  rockets  of  style  which  exploded  in  every  direc- 
tion. Then  there  were  simple  crosses,  and  crosses 
recrossed,  like  those  of  heraldry,  stars,  suns,  Arabic 
or  Roman  numerals,  Greek  or  French  letters,  all 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

imaginable  signs  of  reference  which  mingled  with  the 
lines.  Strips  of  paper  pasted  on  with  wafers  or  stuck 
on  with  pins,  were  added  to  margins  that  proved  in- 
sufficient, and  rayed  with  lines,  in  fine  writing  to  save 
room,  —  lines  which  were  themselves  full  of  correc- 
tions, for  one  was  scarcely  made  than  it  was  again 
improved  upon.  The  printed  poster  disappeared  almost 
altogether  in  the  centre  of  this  cabalistic-looking  scrawl, 
which  compositors  passed  to  each  other,  none  of  them 
being  willing  to  work  longer  than  one  hour  at  a  time 
at  Balzac's  manuscript.  The  next  day  the  printer  sent 
back  the  posters,  which,  the  corrections  having  been 
made,  were  already  twice  as  numerous  as  before. 
Balzac  set  to  work  again,  still  developing,  adding  a 
trait,  a  detail,  a  picture,  some  remark  on  manners,  a 
characteristic  expression,  a  striking  sentence,  com- 
pelling the  form  to  render  the  idea  more  closely, 
getting  ever  closer  to  the  thought  in  his  mind, 
choosing,  as  does  a  painter,  the  final  line  out  of 
three  or  four  contours.  Often  after  he  had  fin- 
ished that  terrific  work,  with  that  intensity  of  atten- 
tion of  which  he  alone  was  capable,  he  would  perceive 
that  he  had  failed  to  express  his  thought,  that  an 
episode  was  too  prominent,  that  a  figure  which  he 

66 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

intended  to  be  secondary  in  the  general  effect  stood 
out  too  prominently,  and  with  one  stroke  of  the 
pen  he  would  courageously  destroy  the  result  of  four 
or  five  nights  of  labour.  He  was  really  heroic  under 
such  circumstances. 

Six,  seven,  sometimes  ten  proofs  came  back,  deleted, 
worked  over,  before  Balzac's  desire  for  perfection  was 
satisfied.  I  have  seen  at  the  Jardies,  on  the  shelves 
of  a  library  composed  exclusively  of  his  own  works, 
every  different  proof  of  the  same  book,  from  the  first 
draft  to  the  final  printed  book,  bound  in  a  separate 
volume.  A  comparison  of  the  thought  of  Balzac  in 
its  different  states  would  be  a  very  interesting  study, 
and  would  teach  valuable  lessons  in  literature.  Near 
these  volumes  a  sinister-looking  book  bound  in  black 
morocco,  without  tooling  or  gilding,  drew  my  attention. 
"  Take  it,"  said  Balzac ;  "  it  is  an  unpublished  work 
which  is  of  some  value."  The  title  was  "  Melancholy 
Accounts."  The  book  contained  a  list  of  debts, 
dates  when  notes  fell  due,  the  amounts  given  trades- 
men, and  all  the  frightful  papers  which  the  Stamp 
Office  legalises.  This  volume,  through  a  sort  of 
quizzical  contrast,  was  placed  side  by  side  with  the 
"  Contes  drolatiques,"  "  of  which  it  is  not  the  continua- 

67 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

tion,"  laughingly  added  the  author  of  the  "  Comedie 
humaine." 

In  spite  of  his  laborious  method  of  work,  Balzac 
produced  a  great  deal,  thanks  to  his  superhuman  will, 
which  was  served  by  his  athletic  temperament  and  his 
monkish  mode  of  life.  For  two  or  three  months  at  a 
time,  when  he  had  some  important  work  under  way, 
he  wrote  for  sixteen  to  eighteen  hours  out  of  the 
twenty-four.  He  gave  to  the  body  six  hours  only  of  a 
heavy,  feverish,  convulsive  sleep,  brought  on  by  the 
torpor  of  digestion  after  a  hastily  eaten  meal.  At  such 
times  he  disappeared  completely,  his  best  friends  lost 
track  of  him  j  but  he  soon  emerged  from  under  ground, 
waving  a  masterpiece  above  his  head,  laughing  with 
that  hearty  laugh  of  his,  applauding  himself  with  per- 
fect artlessness,  and  bestowing  on  himself  praise  which 
I  am  bound  to  say  he  never  sought  of  any  one.  No 
author  cared  less  than  he  did  about  the  reviews  and 
notices  of  his  books.  He  allowed  his  reputation  to 
grow  up  of  itself  without  helping  it  on,  and  he  never 
paid  court  to  newspaper  men.  Besides,  that  would 
have  taken  up  his  time.  He  delivered  his  copy, 
drew  his  money,  and  hastened  to  distribute  it  to 
creditors  who  often  waited  for  him  in  the  yard  of 

68 


************************ 

HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

the  newspaper  office,  as  did,  for  instance,  the  builder 
of  the  Jardies. 

Sometimes  he  would  come  to  my  rooms  in  the 
morning,  breathless,  exhausted,  dazed  by  the  fresh  air, 
like  Vulcan  escaping  from  his  forge.  He  would  throw 
himself  on  a  divan.  His  long  night-watches  had  made 
him  hungry,  and  he  would  crush  sardines  in  butter, 
making  a  sort  of  pomade  which  recalled  to  him  the 
Tours  rillettes,  and  which  he  spread  upon  slices  of 
bread.  That  was  his  favourite  dish.  No  sooner  had 
he  dined  than  he  would  fall  asleep,  asking  me  to 
awaken  him  in  an  hour's  time.  Disregarding  his  re- 
quest, I  would  respect  his  well-earned  sleep  and  take 
care  that  no  noise  was  made  in  the  house.  But  when 
Balzac  awoke  and  saw  the  twilight  spreading  its  grey 
shadows  throughout  the  heavens,  he  would  spring  up 
and  overwhelm  me  with  insults,  calling  me  traitor,  rob- 
ber, and  murderer;  I  had  made  him  lose  ten  thousand 
francs,  for  if  I  had  awakened  him,  he  might  have 
thought  of  a  novel  which  would  have  brought  in  that 
amount,  to  say  nothing  of  the  profits  from  subsequent 
editions.  I  was  the  cause  of  the  gravest  catastrophes 
and  of  unmentionable  disorders ;  I  had  made  him  miss 
appointments  with  bankers,  publishers,  and  duchesses ; 

69 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

he  would  not  be  prepared  now  to  pay  his  notes  when 
they  came  due;  that  fatal  sleep  would  cost  him  mil- 
lions. But  I  was  already  accustomed  to  the  prodigious 
arithmetical  sums  which  Balzac,  starting  from  the 
smallest  amounts,  carried  on  to  the  most  startling  totals, 
and  I  was  easily  consoled  on  seeing  his  fine  colour 
reappear  upon  his  rested  face. 

Balzac  at  that  time  was  living  at  Chaillot,  rue  des 
Batailles,  in  a  house  from  which  there  was  a  lovely 
prospect,  —  the  Seine,  the  Champ  de  Mars,  the  dome 
of  the  Invalides,  a  large  portion  of  Paris,  and  in  the 
distance  the  hills  of  Meudon.  He  had  furnished  the 
house  rather  luxuriously,  for  he  knew  that  in  Paris  a 
man  of  talent  who  is  poor  is  not  much  believed  in,  and 
that  the  appearance  of  wealth  often  brings  the  reality. 
It  was  at  this  time  that  he  indulged  in  elegance  and 
dandyism,  that  he  wore  his  famous  blue  coat  with  but- 
tons of  massive  gold,  that  he  carried  the  enormous 
stick  with  its  turquoise  top,  that  he  went  to  the  Bouffes 
and  the  Opera,  and  appeared  more  frequently  in  soci- 
ety, where  his  brilliant  high  spirits  made  him  always 
most  welcome,  —  a  frequentation  which,  besides,  he 
turned  to  account,  for  in  the  course  of  his  visits  he 
came  upon  more  than  one  model.  It  was  not  easy  to 

70 


************************ 

HONQRE    DE    BALZAC 

enter  his  house,  which  was  better  guarded  than  ever 
was  the  Garden  of  the  Hesperides.  Two  or  three 
pass-words  were  necessary,  and  Balzac  often  changed 
them  for  fear  they  should  become  known.  I  can 
remember  some.  You  had  to  say  to  the  porter, 
"  The  plum  season  has  come,"  and  he  allowed  you  to 
cross  the  threshold.  To  the  servant  who  answered  the 
bell  you  had  to  whisper,  "  I  am  bringing  Belgian  lace." 
If  you  could  assure  the  valet  that  "  Madame  Bertrand 
was  in  good  health,"  you  were  at  last  introduced. 
This  nonsense  greatly  delighted  Balzac.  It  may  have 
been  necessary  to  keep  away  bores  and  other  visitors 
still  more  disagreeable.  In  the  "  Fille  aux  yeux  d'or," 
there  is  a  description  of  the  drawing-room  in  the  house 
of  the  rue  des  Batailles.  It  is  scrupulously  accurate, 
and  the  reader  may  be  interested  in  an  account  of  the 
lion's  den  by  the  lion  himself.  Not  a  single  detail  has 
been  added  or  omitted  :  — 

"  One  half  of  the  boudoir  formed  a  softly  graceful  circular 
line  which  contrasted  with  the  perfectly  square  other  half,  in 
the  centre  of  which  stood  a  mantelpiece  in  white  marble  and 
gold.  The  entrance  was  through  a  side  door  concealed  by  a 
rich  portiere  of  tapestry,  opposite  a  window.  The  horse-shoe 
end  was  furnished  with  a  real  Turkish  divan,  —  that  is,  a 

71 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

mattress  thrown  on  the  ground,  but  a  mattress  as  broad  as 
a  bed;  a  divan  fifty  feet  in  length,  of  white  cashmere  orna- 
mented with  puffs  of  black  and  crimson  silk  arranged  in  loz- 
enges. The  back  of  this  huge  bed  rose  several  inches  above 
the  cushions,  which  made  it  still  richer  by  the  tastefulness  of 
their  ornamentation.  The  boudoir  was  hung  with  a  red 
stuff,  over  which  was  laid  Indian  muslin  fluted  like  Corinthian 
columns,  the  fluting  alternately  concave  and  convex,  and  held 
in  at  the  top  and  bottom  by  a  band  of  crimson-coloured  stuff 
on  which  were  drawn  black  arabesques.  Under  the  muslin 
the  crimson  turned  to  rose-colour,  an  amorous  colour,  re- 
peated by  the  window  curtains,  which  were  of  Indian  muslin 
lined  with  rose  taffeta  and  adorned  with  crimson  and  black 
fringes.  Six  silver-gilt  bracket  candelabra,  each  bearing  a 
wax  taper,  were  fixed  to  the  hangings  at  equal  distances  to 
give  light  to  the  divan.  The  -  ceiling,  from  the  centre  of 
which  hung  a  dulled  silver-gilt  chandelier,  was  of  sparkling 
whiteness.  The  cornice  was  gilded.  The  carpet  resembled 
an  Oriental  shawl,  the  pattern  of  which  it  reproduced,  and 
it  recalled  the  poetry  of  the  Persian  land  where  it  had 
been  wrought  by  the  hands  of  slaves.  The  furniture  was 
covered  with  white  cashmere,  relieved  by  black  and  crimson 
ornaments.  The  clock  and  candelabra  were  of  white  marble. 
The  only  table  in  the  room  was  covered  with  a  cashmere 
shawl ;  elegant  flower-stands  held  roses  of  all  kinds,  and  white 
or  red  flowers." 

I  may  add  that  on  the  table  stood  a  superb  inkstand  in 
gold  and  malachite,  no  doubt  the  gift  of  some  admirer. 

72 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

It  was  with  childish  satisfaction  that  Balzac  showed 
me  this  boudoir,  made  out  of  a  square  drawing-room, 
and  necessarily  leaving  empty  places  in  the  corners  of 
the  rounded  half.  When  I  had  sufficiently  admired 
the  coquettish  splendour  of  the  room,  the  luxury  of 
which  would  not  strike  one  so  much  to-day,  Balzac 
opened  a  secret  door  and  led  me  into  a  dark  passage 
behind  the  hemicycle.  At  one  of  the  corners  was  a 
narrow  iron  bedstead  ;  in  the  other  there  was  a  table 
u  with  all  necessary  materials  for  writing,"  as  M. 
Scribe  says  in  his  stage  directions.  It  was  there  that 
Balzac  took  refuge  in  order  to  work  safe  from  any 
surprise  and  any  investigation. 

The  partition  was  covered  with  several  thicknesses 
of  cloth  and  paper  so  as  to  cut  off  any  sound  from  one 
side  or  the  other.  In  order  to  be  certain  that  none 
could  reach  him  from  the  drawing-room,  Balzac  asked 
me  to  go  back  into  the  room  and  shout  as  loud  as  I 
could.  He  could  still  hear  me  a  little,  so  more  gray 
paper  had  to  be  pasted  on  to  completely  deaden  the 
sound.  All  these  mysterious  ways  greatly  puzzled  me, 
and  I  asked  the  reason  of  them.  Balzac  gave  me  a 
reason  which  Stendhal  would  have  approved,  but  which 
modern  prudery  prevents  my  repeating.  The  fact  is 

73 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

that  he  was  already  weaving  in  his  mind  the  scene 
between  Henry  de  Marsay  and  Paquita,  and  he  was 
anxious  to  know  whether  the  cries  of  the  victim  in  a 
drawing-room  thus  fitted  could  reach  the  ears  of  the 
other  inhabitants  of  the  house. 

He  entertained  me  in  that  same  room  at  a  splendid 
dinner,  for  which  he  lighted  with  his  own  hand  all  the 
tapers  in  the  silver-gilt  candelabra,  the  chandelier,  and 
the  candelabra  on  the  mantelpiece.  The  guests  were 
the  Marquis  de  Belloy  and  Louis  Boulanger  the 
painter.  Although  very  sober  and  abstemious  usually, 
Balzac  did  not  hesitate  from  time  to  time  to  indulge  in 
a  little  good  cheer.  He  ate  with  jovial  gormandism 
which  gave  one  an  appetite,  and  he  drank  like  Panta- 
gruel.  Four  bottles  of  the  white  wine  of  Vouvray,  one 
of  the  headiest  known,  had  absolutely  no  effect  upon 
his  strong  head,  and  merely  gave  more  sparkle  to  his 
wit.  What  rare  stories  he  told  us !  Rabelais, 
Beroalde  de  Verville,  Eutrapel,  Poggio,  Straparola,  the 
Queen  of  Navarre,  and  all  the  doctors  of  the  gay 
science  would  have  acknowledged  in  him  a  disciple 
and  a  master. 


74 


HONQRE     DE     BALZAC 

IV 

ONE  of  Balzac's  dreams  was  of  a  heroic,  devoted 
friendship,  —  two  souls,  two  courages,  two  minds 
united  in  the  same  will.  Pierre  and  Jaffier  in  Otway's 
u  Venice  Preserved "  struck  him  very  much,  and  he 
refers  to  them  repeatedly.  The  "  Histoire  des  Treize  " 
is  merely  the  development  of  this  idea,  —  a  powerful 
unit  composed  of  multiple  beings  all  working  blindly 
for  an  end  agreed  upon  by  all.  Every  one  knows  what 
striking,  mysterious,  terrible  effects  he  drew  from  it  in 
"  Ferragus,"  "  La  Duchesse  de  Langeais,"  "  La  Fille 
aux  yeux  d'or ; "  but  real  life  and  mental  life  were 
never  wholly  separated  by  Balzac  as  they  are  by  other 
authors,  and  his  creations  followed  him  beyond  his 
study.  He  wished  to  form  an  association  after  the 
fashion  of  that  which  united  Ferragus,  Montriveau, 
Ronquerolles,  and  other  comrades ;  only,  he  did  not 
propose  to  emulate  their  bold  enterprises.  A  certain 
number  of  friends  were  to  help  each  other  on  every 
occasion  and  to  strive  to  the  best  of  their  ability  to  help 
on  the  success  of  the  one  selected,  with,  of  course,  the 
understanding  that  the  latter  should  in  his  turn  work 
for  the  others.  Deeply  infatuated  with  his  project, 

75 


************************ 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

Balzac  recruited  a  few  friends  whom  he  brought  to- 
gether only  after  taking  as  many  precautions  as  if  he 
were  organising  a  political  society  or  a  Carbonari  vente. 
The  quite  needless  mystery  greatly  tickled  him,  and  he 
set  about  carrying  out  his  idea  in  the  most  serious 
fashion  possible.  When  he  had  selected  his  adepts,  he 
called  them  together  and  informed  them  of  the  purpose 
of  the  society.  It  is  unnecessary  to  say  that  every  one 
at  once  fell  in  with  his  views  and  that  the  statutes 
were  adopted  with  enthusiastic  unanimity.  No  one 
possessed  to  such  a  degree  as  Balzac  the  power  of  daz- 
zling, exciting,  and  intoxicating  the  coolest  heads,  the 
most  solid  intellects.  He  had  an  overflowing,  tumult- 
uous, compelling  eloquence  which  carried  you  off,  strive 
as  you  might  to  resist.  It  was  impossible  to  make  any 
objections ;  he  immediately  overwhelmed  you  with  such 
a  deluge  of  words  that  you  had  perforce  to  keep  silence. 
Besides,  he  had  a  reply  always  ready,  and  cast  on  you 
such  lightning-like  glances,  so  brilliant,  so  full  of  mag- 
netism, that  he  filled  you  with  his  own  desire.  The 
association,  which  numbered  among  its  members  G.  de 
C.,  Leon  Gozlan,  Louis  Desnoyers,  Jules  Sandeau, 
Merle,  who  was  called  Handsome  Merle,  myself,  and  a 
few  others  whom  it  is  unnecessary  to  name,  was  called 

76 


HONORE     DE     BALZAC 

«  The  Red  Horse."  Why  "  The  Red  Horse,"  you 
may  say,  rather  than  the  Golden  Lion  or  the  Cross  of 
Malta  ?  Because  the  first  meeting  of  the  initiated  took 
place  at  a  restaurant  on  the  Quai  de  1'Entrepot,  at  the 
end  of  the  Tournelle  Bridge.  The  sign,  a  red  horse, 
suggested  to  Balzac  the  quaint,  unintelligible,  cabalistic 
name  of  his  society.  When  any  project  had  to  be 
framed,  when  any  steps  had  to  be  agreed  upon,  Balzac, 
who  had  been  unanimously  elected  Grand  Master  of 
the  order,  sent  by  one  of  the  initiated  to  each  horse 
(that  was  the  slang  name  borne  by  the  members  among 
themselves),  a  letter  on  which  was  drawn  a  little  red 
steed,  with  these  words,  "Stable,  on  such  a  day  and  at 
such  a  place."  The  place  was  occasionally  changed, 
lest  curiosity  or  suspicion  should  be  aroused.  In  so- 
ciety, although  we  all  were  acquainted  with  each  other 
and  had  long  been  so  for  the  most  part,  we  were  bound 
to  avoid  speaking  to  each  other,  or  at  least,  to  speak 
very  coldly,  so  as  to  remove  any  thought  of  connivance. 
Often  in  a  drawing-room,  Balzac  would  pretend  that 
he  was  meeting  me  for  the  first  time,  and  with  winks 
and  grimaces  like  those  of  actors  in  their  asides,  he 
would  draw  my  attention  to  his  cleverness  and  seem  to 
say  to  me, "  See  how  cleverly  I  am  playing  the  game  !  " 

77 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

What  did  "The  Red  Horse"  propose  to  do?  To 
change  the  government,  to  institute  a  new  religion,  to 
found  a  school  of  philosophy,  to  master  men,  or  seduce 
women  ?  Much  less  than  that.  We  were  to  get  hold 
of  the  papers,  to  manage  the  theatres,  to  get  elected  to 
the  Academy,  to  be  made  companions  or  knights  of 
ever  so  many  orders,  and  to  end  our  days  modestly  as 
peers  of  France,  ministers,  and  millionaires.  It  was 
very  easy  to  do,  according  to  Balzac;  all  that  was 
needed  was  to  work  in  harmony,  and  our  modest 
ambition  proved  the  moderation  of  our  character.  That 
devil  of  a  man  had  such  a  powerful  sense  of  vision  that 
he  described  to  each  of  us,  down  to  the  smallest  details, 
the  splendid  and  glorious  life  which  our  association 
would  secure  for  us.  As  we  listened  to  him,  we 
already  saw  ourselves  leaning,  in  some  fine  mansion, 
on  white  marble  mantelpieces,  red  ribbons  around  our 
necks,  stars  of  brilliants  on  our  breasts,  receiving 
affably  political,  artistic,  and  literary  celebrities,  all  of 
them  amazed  at  our  mysterious  and  rapid  fortune.  The 
future  did  not  exist  for  Balzac ;  with  him  everything 
was  in  the  present.  When  he  evoked  the  future,  he 
drew  it  out  of  its  haze  and  made  it  tangible.  His  ideas 
were  so  vivid  that  they  became  real  to  him.  If  he 

78 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

spoke  of  a  dinner,  he  ate  it  while  he  described  it ;  of 
a  carriage,  he  felt  its  soft  cushions  and  its  springs ; 
perfect  comfort,  deep  satisfaction  were  then  depicted 
on  his  features,  although  possibly  he  was  actually 
hungry  and  walking  over  a  sharp  pavement  with 
worn-out  shoes. 

The  whole  company  was  to  push,  praise,  laud,  in 
articles,  in  notices,  in  conversation,  any  member  who 
had  just  published  a  book  or  had  a  play  performed. 
Whoever  had  shown  hostility  to  one  of  the  "horses  " 
was  to  draw  down  on  himself  the  kicks  of  the  whole 
stable.  "  The  Red  Horse "  was  unforgiving.  The 
culprit  became  a  mark  for  hostile  criticisms,  weari- 
some iterations,  pin-pricks,  sarcasms,  and  other  means 
of  driving  a  man  to  despair  well  known  to  the  smaller 
fry  of  the  press. 

I  smile  as,  after  so  many  years,  I  betray  the  innocent 
secret  of  that  literary  free-masonry  which  had  no  other 
result  than  a  few  notices  of  a  book  the  success  of 
which  did  not  call  for  such  help  ;  but  at  the  time  I 
took  the  matter  seriously;  I  imagined  we  were  the 
Thirteen  themselves  in  very  deed,  and  I  was  surprised 
to  find  that  obstacles  still  existed,  —  but  this  world  is 
so  badly  made.  I  used  to  put  on  an  important,  mys- 

79 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

terious  air  as  I  elbowed  other  men,  poor  dullards  who 
had  no  suspicion  of  my  power.  After  four  or  five 
meetings  "  The  Red  Horse "  ceased  to  live,  most  of 
the  u  horses  "  not  having  the  wherewithal  to  pay  for 
their  oats  at  the  symbolical  manger,  and  the  association 
which  was  to  appropriate  everything  was  dissolved  be- 
cause the  members  often  lacked  five  francs,  the  price 
of  the  meal.  So  each  one  of  us  plunged  back  by  him- 
self into  the  battle  of  life,  and  fought  his  own  fight ; 
and  that  is  why  Balzac  never  belonged  to  the  Academy, 
and  died  a  knight  of  the  Legion  of  Honour  only. 

Yet  the  idea  was  a  sound  one,  for  Balzac,  as  he 
himself  says  of  Nucingen,  could  not  possibly  have  a 
poor  idea.  Others  who  have  succeeded  turned  it  to 
account  without  shrouding  it  in  the  same  romanesque 
fancifulness. 

Thrown  by  one  chimera,  Balzac  immediately 
climbed  on  another  and  set  off  for  another  trip 
into  Fairyland,  with  that  childish  artlessness  which 
was  so  naturally  united  in  him  to  the  deepest  sagacity 
and  the  craftiest  mind. 

How  many  a  strange  project  did  he  unfold  to  me, 
how  many  a  quaint  paradox  did  he  maintain,  and 
always  with  the  same  good  faith.  Sometimes  he 

80 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

maintained  that  one  ought  to  live  at  a  cost  of  not  more 
than  nine  sous  a  day ;  at  others,  he  insisted  that  a  hun- 
dred thousand  francs  was  the  least  with  which  one 
could  be  comfortable.  Once,  having  been  asked  by 
me  to  figure  up  the  items,  he  replied  to  my  objection 
that  there  were  still  thirty  thousand  francs  unspent, 
.  with  :  "  Well,  that  will  do  for  the  butter  and  radishes. 
What  kind  of  a  house  is  that  which  does  not  spend 
thirty  thousand  francs  in  radishes  and  butter  ? "  I 
wish  I  could  paint  the  glance  of  sovereign  contempt 
which  he  let  fall  on  me  as  he  uttered  that  triumphant 
reply.  His  glance  meant :  "  Decidedly,  Theo  is  but  a 
poor  fool,  a  skinned  rat,  a  mean  mind.  He  cannot 
understand  life  on  a  great  scale,  and  has  never  eaten 
anything  but  Breton  salt  butter." 

The  public  became  much  interested  in  the  Jardies 
when  Balzac  purchased  the  place  With  the  honour- 
able intention  of  securing  a  property  for  his  mother. 
Every  one  who  travelled  by  the  railway  which  passes 
by  Ville-d'Avray  looked  curiously  at  the  little  house, 
half  cottage,  half  chalet,  which  rose  upon  the  clay 
slope. 

The  ground,  according  to  Balzac,  was  the  best  pos- 
sible. Formerly,  he  maintained,  a  certain  famous  wine 

6  81 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

was  grown  there,  and  the  grapes,  thanks  to  an  unparal- 
leled exposure,  cooked  themselves  ripe,  like  the  Tokay 
grapes  on  the  Bohemian  hills.  It  is  true  that  the  sun 
had  ample  opportunity  to  ripen  the  grapes  on  this  spot, 
for  there  was  but  a  single  tree.  Balzac  endeavoured  to 
enclose  his  property  with  walls,  which  became  famous 
by  their  perseveringly  falling  down,  or  sliding  in  a  heap 
down  the  too  steep  slope ;  and  he  dreamed  of  raising 
on  this  land,  favoured  by  heaven,  the  most  fabulous 
and  the  most  exotic  crops.  Here  naturally  comes  in 
the  story  of  the  pine-apples  ;  a  story  which  has  been 
so  often  repeated  that  I  should  not  tell  it  again  but  that 
I  am  able  to  add  to  it  a  genuinely  characteristic  trait. 
This  was  the  plan :  One  hundred  thousand  pine-apple 
plants  were  to  be  set  in  the  garden  of  the  Jardies, 
transformed  into  hot-houses,  which  would  require  but 
little  heating,  thanks  to  the  very  sunny  exposure.  The 
pine-apples  were  to  be  sold  at  five  francs,  instead  of 
the  usual  price  of  twenty-five  francs,  —  that  is,  they 
would  bring  in  five  hundred  thousand  francs.  From 
this  sum  was  to  be  deducted  one  hundred  thousand 
francs  for  the  expenses  of  cultivation,  glazing,  and 
heating ;  there  remained,  therefore,  four  hundred  thou- 
sand francs  net  profit,  which  would  give  the  happy 

82 


HONORE     DE     BALZAC 

owner  a  splendid  income,  —  "without  writing  a  word 
of  copy,"  he  would  add.  That  was  nothing :  Balzac 
framed  a  thousand  plans  of  the  sort.  But  the  beauty 
of  it  was  that  we  hunted  together  on  the  Boulevard 
Montmartre  for  a  shop  in  which  to  sell  the  yet  un- 
planted  pine-apples.  The  shop  was  to  be  painted 
black  with  gold  lines,  and  to  have  a  sign  in  huge 
letters,  "Jardies  Pine-apples." 

As  far  as  Balzac  was  concerned,  the  hundred  thou- 
sand pine-apples  were  already  shooting  up  their  aigrettes 
of  dentellated  leaves  above  their  great  golden,  lozenged 
cones  under  vast  glass  roofs ;  he  could  see  them ;  he 
enjoyed  the  high  temperature  of  the  hot-house,  he 
breathed  in  its  tropical  perfume  with  dilated  and  de- 
lighted nostrils.  And  when,  having  returned  to  his 
room,  he  gazed,  leaning  on  the  window,  at  the  snow 
which  was  silently  falling  upon  the  bare  slopes,  even 
then  he  scarcely  lost  his  illusion.  Yet  he  did  take  my 
advice  not  to  hire  the  shop  until  the  following  year,  so 
as  to  avoid  useless  expense. 

I  am  writing  down  my  remembrances  as  they  come 
back  to  me,  without  trying  to  connect  what  must 
necessarily  be  unconnected.  Besides,  as  Boileau  used 
to  say,  transitions  are  the  great  difficulty  in  poetry, — 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

and  in  articles,  I  might  add  ;  but  modern  journalists 
have  neither  so  much  conscience  nor  especially  so 
much  leisure  as  the  Regent  of  Parnassus. 

Madame  de  Girardin  professed  for  Balzac  a  lively 
admiration,  for  which  he  was  grateful  and  in  return 
for  which  he  paid  her  frequent  visits,  although  he  was 
rightly  very  chary  of  his  time  and  his  working-hours. 
Never  did  any  woman  possess  to  so  great  a  degree  as 
Delphine  —  as  we  allowed  ourselves  to  call  her  famil- 
iarly among  ourselves  —  the  gift  of  stirring  up  the 
minds  of  her  guests.  In  her  company  one  was  always 
in  good  spirits,  and  every  one  left  the  room  delighted 
with  himself.  There  was  no  pebble  so  hard  that  she 
could  not  make  a  spark  flash  from  it,  and  with  Balzac, 
as  you  will  easily  imagine,  it  was  not  necessary  to 
strike  the  steel  long.  He  sparkled  at  once  and  took 
fire.  Balzac  was  not  exactly  what  is  called  a  con- 
versationalist, quick  in  repartee,  throwing  a  clever, 
decisive  remark  into  a  discussion,  changing  the  subject 
as  the  talk  goes,  touching  lightly  on  everything  and 
never  going  beyond  a  half-smile.  He  had  an  irresist- 
ible rush,  eloquence,  and  fire  of  conversation,  and  as 
everybody  kept  silence  to  listen  to  him  —  in  his  case, 
to  the  general  satisfaction  —  the  conversation  rapidly 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

turned  into  a  monologue.  His  starting-point  was 
soon  forgotten  and  he  passed  from  anecdotes  to  philo- 
sophical reflections,  from  observations  of  manners  to 
descriptions  of  places.  As  he  spoke,  his  face  flushed, 
his  eyes  became  peculiarly  brilliant,  his  voice  assumed 
different  inflections,  and  sometimes  he  would  burst 
out  laughing,  amused  by  the  buffoon  apparitions  which 
he  saw  before  he  described  them.  In  this  way  he 
used  to  announce,  by  a  sort  of  trumpet-blare,  the 
arrival  of  his  caricatures  and  his  jokes,  and  the  listen- 
ers soon  shared  his  hilarity.  Although  we  were  then 
in  the  days  of  dreamers,  long-haired  like  weeping 
willows,  of  weepers  in  skiffs,  and  of  Byronian,  disillu- 
sioned youth,  Balzac  possessed  that  robust  and  power- 
ful gaiety  which  Rabelais  is  supposed  to  have  shared, 
and  which  Moliere  exhibited  in  his  plays  only.  The 
broad  laugh  upon  his  sensual  lips  was  that  of  a  kindly 
god  whom  the  sight  of  the  human  marionettes  amuses, 
and  who  does  not  worry  over  anything  because  he 
understands  everything  and  sees  both  sides  at  once. 
Neither  the  troubles  attendant  on  his  position,  so 
often  precarious,  nor  money  worries,  nor  the  fatigue 
of  excessive  work,  nor  his  claustration  for  study,  nor 
his  renunciation  of  all  the  pleasures  of  life,  nor  even 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

sickness  itself  could  strike  down  the  Herculean  jovial- 
ity which  was,  in  my  opinion,  one  of  the  most  striking 
characteristics  of  Balzac.  He  laughed  as  he  smashed 
hydras,  he  was  happy  as  he  tore  lions  asunder,  and 
carried  as  if  it  were  a  hare  the  boar  of  Erymanthus 
on  his  mighty,  muscular  shoulders.  At  the  least 
provocation  his  gaiety  broke  out  and  made  his  great 
breast  heave.  Sometimes,  indeed,  it  would  shock  a 
refined  person,  but  however  much  one  might  endeavour 
to  remain  serious,  it  had  perforce  to  be  shared.  And 
yet  you  are  not  to  suppose  that  Balzac  sought  to 
amuse  the  gallery ;  he  merely  yielded  to  a  sort  of 
internal  intoxication,  and  painted  with  rapid  strokes, 
with  intense  comicality  and  incomparable  talent  for 
buffoonery,  the  strange  phantasmagoria  which  whirled 
around  in  the  camera  obscura  of  his  brain.  I  cannot 
better  compare  the  impressions  produced  by  innumer- 
able conversations  of  his  than  to  those  one  experiences 
on  looking  over  the  strange  drawings  of  the  "  Songes 
drolatiques  "  by  Master  Alcofribas  Nasier,  which  rep- 
resent monstrous  creatures  made  up  of  the  most 
dissimilar  elements.  Some  have  by  way  of  a  head 
a  pair  of  bellows,  the  air-hole  of  which  represents  the 
eye ;  others  have  the  stem  of  an  alembic  for  a  nose  ; 

86 


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HONORS    DE    BALZAC 

others  again  walk  upon  castors  instead  of  feet ;  others 
are  round  like  the  paunch  of  a  stewpan  and  have  a 
cover  for  a  head;  but  intense  life  fills  these  imagi- 
nary beings,  and  in  their  grimacing  faces  one  recog- 
nises the  vices,  follies,  and  passions  of  men.  Some, 
although  absurd,  almost  stop  you  dead,  as  would  por- 
traits ;  you  could  put  a  name  to  them. 

When  you  listened  to  Balzac,  a  whole  carnival  of 
extravagant  and  real  fantocci  pranced  before  your  eyes, 
wearing  on  their  shoulders  a  variegated  sentence, 
waving  long  sleeves  of  epithets,  noisily  blowing  their 
noses  with  an  adverb,  slapping  around  with  a  bat  of 
antitheses,  pulling  you  by  the  skirt  of  your  coat  and 
telling  your  secrets  in  your  ear  in  a  nasal,  disguised 
voice,  pirouetting  and  whirling  in  the  midst  of  a 
sparkle  of  lights  and  spangles.  It  was  bewildering, 
and  very  soon  you  felt,  like  Wagner  after  the  speech 
of  Mephistopheles,  a  mill-stone  whirling  in  your 
brain. 

He  was  not  always  in  such  very  high  spirits,  and 
then  one  of  his  favourite  amusements  was  to  imitate 
the  German  jargon  of  Nucingen  or  Schmuke,  or  else 
to  talk  rama  like  the  clients  of  the  boarding-house  of 
Madame  Vauquer  (nee  Conflans).  At  the  time  when 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

he  wrote  "  Un  Debut  dans  la  vie,"  on  a  sketch  by 
Madame  de  Surville,  he  was  hunting  for  transposed 
proverbs,  to  be  spoken  by  Mistigris,  the  painter's 
apprentice,  to  whom  later,  thinking  him  witty,  he 
assigned  a  fine  position  in  the  u  Comedie  humaine," 
under  the  name  of  the  landscape  painter  Leon  de  Lora. 
Here  are  some  of  the  proverbs  :  "  Profit  is  not  without 
honour,"  "  A  bird  in  the  hand  gathers  no  moss," 
"Accessions  will  happen  in  the  best  regulated  families," 
"  One  touch  of  nature  makes  the  whole  world  blush," 
"  Flirtation  is  the  thief  of  time,"  "  Poets  are  born 
not  maids,"  etc.  To  come  upon  a  good  one  put  him 
in  the  best  of  tempers,  and  he  would  skip  with  the 
grace  of  an  elephant  about  the  furniture  all  round  the 
drawing  room.  On  her  part,  Madame  de  Girardin 
was  hunting  for  witticisms  for  the  famous  "Lady 
with  the  Seven  little  Chairs "  of  the  Courrier  de 
Paris.  My  help  was  sometimes  required  in  this 
matter,  and  if  a  stranger  had  entered  and  had  seen 
the  beautiful  Delphine  drawing  her  white  fingers 
through  her  golden  curls  with  an  air  of  deep  reverie; 
Balzac  sunk  in  a  great  upholstered  armchair  in  which 
M.  de  Girardin  usually  slept,  his  closed  fists  rammed 
into  his  trousers  pockets,  his  waistcoat  rolled  up  above 

88 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

his  stomach,  swinging  one  leg  monotonously  and 
rhythmically,  and  testifying  by  the  contracted  muscles 
of  his  face  to  extraordinary  mental  effort ;  me  crouched 
between  two  cushions  on  the  divan  like  an  opium 
eater  in  an  ecstasy,  —  the  stranger  could  certainly 
never  have  suspected  what  we  were  meditating  upon 
so  deeply.  He  would  have  taken  it  for  granted  that 
Balzac  was  thinking  of  a  new  Mme.  Firmiani,  Madame 
de  Girardin  of  a  new  part  for  Mademoiselle  Rachel, 
and  I  of  some  sonnet.  And  he  would  have  been  very 
far  astray.  As  for  puns,  Balzac,  though  his  great 
ambition  was  to  make  them,  had,  after  conscientious 
efforts,  to  acknowledge  his  notorious  incapacity  in 
this  respect,  and  to  keep  to  the  travestied  proverbs 
which  preceded  the  approximate  puns  which  the 
common-sense  school  made  fashionable.  What  de- 
lightful evenings  that  will  never  return  !  We  were 
far  then  from  foreseeing  that  the  tall,  splendid  woman, 
formed  like  an  antique  statue,  that  the  robust,  quick 
man  who  united  in  himself  the  vigour  of  the  boar 
and  the  bull,  half  Hercules,  half  satyr,  built  to  outlast 
a  century,  would  so  soon  go  to  sleep  the  last  sleep, 
the  one  at  Montmartre,  the  other  at  Pere-Lachaise, 
and  that  of  the  three  I  should  remain  alone  to  preserve 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

those  remembrances  already  distant  and  so  near  being 
forgotten. 

Like  his  father,  who  died  by  accident  when  he  was 
more  than  eighty  years  old,  Balzac  believed  himself 
destined  to  live  long.  He  often  talked  over  his  proj- 
ects for  the  future  with  me.  He  was  going  to  finish 
the  "  Comedie  humaine,"  to  write  the  "  Theory  of  the 
Gait,"  a  u  Monograph  on  Virtue,"  some  fifty  dramas, 
gain  more  wealth,  marry  and  have  two  children,  — 
u  but  not  more ;  two  children  look  well,"  he  would 
say,  "  on  the  back  seat  of  a  carriage."  All  this 
would  necessarily  take  up  time,  and  I  pointed  out 
that  when  he  had  finished  these  jobs  he  would  be 
about  eighty.  "  Eighty  !  "  he  cried,  "  that  is  the  very 
flower  of  age." 

One  day  when  we  were  dining  together  at  M.  Emile 
de  Girardin's,  he  told  us  an  anecdote  about  his  father, 
by  way  of  showing  how  vigorous  was  the  stock  from 
which  he  sprang.  M.  de  Balzac  senior,  who  had  been 
put  into  an  attorney's  office,  took  his  meals,  according 
to  the  custom  of  the  day,  at  the  master's  table  with  the 
other  clerks.  Partridges  were  served.  The  attorney's 
wife,  who  was  watching  the  new-comer  out  of  the 
corner  of  her  eye,  said  to  him,  u  M.  Balzac,  can  you 

90 


HONORS    DE    BALZAC 

carve  ?  "  u  Yes,  Madam,"  replied  the  young  fellow, 
blushing  up  to  his  ears,  and  he  bravely  seized  the  carv- 
ing knife  and  fork.  Being  totally  ignorant  of  culinary 
anatomy,  he  divided  the  partridge  into  four  portions, 
but  so  vigorously  that  he  split  the  dish,  cut  the  cloth, 
and  drove  the  edge  of  the  knife  into  the  table.  It  was 
not  clever,  but  it  exhibited  his  strength.  The  attor- 
ney's wife  smiled,  and  from  that  day  out  Balzac,  the 
young  clerk,  was  treated  very  sweetly  in  that  house. 

The  story,  as  I  tell  it,  seems  cold,  but  it  should  be 
told  with  Balzac's  pantomime  as  he  imitated  upon  his 
own  plate  the  paternal  exploit,  with  the  air  of  terror 
and  resolve  which  he  assumed,  the  fashion  with  which 
he  seized  his  knife  after  having  turned  up  his  sleeves, 
and  with  which  he  drove  his  fork  into  an  imaginary 
partridge,  —  Neptune  driving  away  marine  monsters 
never  handled  his  trident  with  a  more  vigorous  fist. 
And  how  terribly  he  bore  down  upon  it !  His  cheeks 
grew  purple,  his  eyes  jutted  from  his  head.  And  when 
the  operation  was  over,  what  a  glance  of  righteous 
satisfaction  trying  to  conceal  itself  under  modesty,  he 
would  cast  upon  the  guests  ! 

The  truth  is,  Balzac  had  in  him  the  making  of  a 
great  actor.  He  had  a  full,  sonorous  voice,  of  rich 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

and  powerful  timbre,  which  he  could  moderate  and 
make  very  soft  at  need,  and  he  read  admirably  well, 
—  a  talent  which  most  actors  lack.  Whatever  he  told, 
he  acted  it  with  intonations,  grimaces,  and  gestures 
which  in  my  opinion  no  comedian  ever  surpassed. 

I  find  in  u  Marguerite  "  by  Madame  de  Girardin, 
this  souvenir  of  Balzac.  It  is  one  of  the  characters 
in  the  book  who  speaks :  — 

"  He  said  that  Balzac  had  dined  with  him  the  night  before, 
and  had  been  more  brilliant  and  more  sparkling  than  ever. 
He  delighted  us  with  the  story  of  his  trip  to  Austria.  What 
fire  !  what  dash !  what  power  of  imitation !  He  was  mar- 
vellous. His  fashion  of  paying  the  postilions  is  an  invention 
which  a  novelist  of  genius  alone  could  come  upon.  « I  was 
greatly  bothered  at  every  relay,'  he  said.  '  How  could  I  pay  ? 
I  did  not  know  a  word  of  German,  I  did  not  know  the  cur- 
rency of  the  country,  —  it  was  very  difficult.  This  is  what 
I  imagined.  I  had  a  bag  filled  with  small  silver  coins,  kreut- 
zers,  etc.  On  reaching  a  relay  the  postilion  came  to  the 
carriage  window.  I  looked  him  straight  in  the  eye  and  I  put 
into  his  hand  one  kreutzer,  two  kreutzers,  then  three,  then 
four,  and  so  on  until  I  caught  him  smiling.  The  moment  he 
smiled,  I  knew  that  I  had  given  him  one  kreutzer  too  much, 
so  I  promptly  took  back  one,  and  my  man  was  paid.'  ' 

At  the  Jardies  he  read  to  me  "  Mercadet,"  the 
original  "  Mercadet,"  far  fuller,  more  complex  and 

92 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

varied  than  the  play  when  skilfully  and  tactfully  arranged 
for  the  Gymnase  by  d'Ennery.  Balzac,  who,  like 
Tieck,  read  on  without  indicating  acts,  scenes,  or 
names,  made  use  of  a  different  and  perfectly  recog- 
nisable voice  for  each  personage.  The  organs  with 
which  he  endowed  the  different  sorts  of  creditors  were 
of  the  most  startling  comicality.  Some  were  hoarse, 
some  were  honeyed,  some  spoke  fast,  some  slowly, 
some  threateningly,  some  plaintively.  The  crowd  of 
them  yelped,  miauled,  growled,  grumbled,  howled  in 
every  possible  and  impossible  tone.  First,  Debt  sang 
a  solo,  which  soon  an  innumerable  chorus  took  up. 
Creditors  came  out  from  everywhere :  from  behind  the 
stove,  from  below  the  bed,  from  the  drawers  of  the 
bureau;  they  poured  from  the  chimney,  they  filtered 
in  through  the  keyhole;  others  climbed  in  by  the 
window  like  lovers ;  some  sprang  from  the  bottom  of 
a  trunk  like  Jacks-in-the-box,  others  came  through  the 
walls  as  out  of  an  English  trap;  and  they  became  a 
crowd,  a  roaring  multitude,  an  invasion,  a  regular  flood- 
tide.  In  vain  Mercadet  shook  them  off;  others  took 
their  places,  and  as  far  as  one  could  see  there  was  to 
be  made  out  a  dark  host  of  creditors  on  the  march, 
arriving  like  huge  termites  to  devour  their  prey.  I  do 

93 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

not  know  if  the  play  was  better  in  that  form,  but  never 
did  any  performance  produce  such  an  effect  upon  me. 

Balzac,  while  he  was  reading  "  Mercadet,"  was  half 
lying  on  the  long  divan  in  the  Jardies  drawing-room, 
for  he  had  sprained  his  ankle,  having  slipped,  like  his 
walls,  upon  the  clay  soil  of  his  property.  A  little  hair, 
coming  through  the  stuff,  stuck  him  in  the  leg  and 
annoyed  him.  "  The  chintz  is  too  thin,"  he  said, 
"  the  hay  comes  through.  You  will  have  to  put 
thicker  stuff  underneath,"  he  added  as  he  pulled  at  the 
annoying  hair. 

Francois,  the  Caleb  of  our  Ravenswood,  would  not 
suffer  the  splendours  of  the  manor  to  be  laughed  at. 
He  corrected  his  master  and  said  "  hair."  "  Then 
that  scoundrel  of  an  upholsterer  has  swindled  me," 
replied  Balzac.  "  They  are  all  alike,  —  I  had  ordered 
the  thing  stuffed  with  hay.  Damn  the  man !  " 

The  splendours  of  the  Jardies  were  mostly  imag- 
inary. All  Balzac's  friends  can  remember  having  seen 
written  in  charcoal  upon  the  walls,  bare  or  covered 
with  gray  paper,  "  Rosewood  wainscoting,  —  tapestry 
from  the  Gobelins,  —  Venetian  mirror,  —  painting  by 
Raphael."  Gerard  de  Nerval  had  already  decorated  an 
apartment  in  this  fashion,  and  so  we  were  not  sur- 

94 


HONQRE    DE    BALZAC 

prised  at  it.  As  for  Balzac,  he  literally  believed  him- 
self to  be  dwelling  amid  gold,  marble,  and  silks.  But  if 
he  never  finished  the  Jardies,  and  if  his  chimeras  made 
people  laugh,  at  least  he  built  himself  an  eternal  dwell- 
ing, a  monument  more  durable  than  brass,  a  vast  city 
peopled  with  his  creations  and  gilded  by  the  beams  of 
his  glory. 

V 

BY  a  peculiarity  of  temperament  which  he  shared  in 
common  with  several  of  the  most  poetic  writers  of  our 
age,  such  as  Chateaubriand,  Madame  de  Stael,  George 
Sand,  Merimee,  Janin,  Balzac  possessed  neither  the 
gift  nor  the  love  of  verse,  however  great  the  efforts  he 
made  to  attain  to  it.  On  this  point  his  excellent  judg- 
ment, so  deep  and  so  sagacious,  was  at  fault;  he 
admired  somewhat  at  haphazard,  and,  so  to  speak,  as 
public  notoriety  led  him  to  do.  I  do  not  think, 
although  he  professed  great  respect  for  Victor  Hugo, 
that  he  ever  felt  very  much  the  lyrical  qualities  of  the 
poet,  whose  prose,  at  once  sculptural  and  coloured, 
amazed  him.  He,  so  laborious,  nevertheless,  and  who 
turned  a  phrase  over  as  many  times  as  rimesters  may 
put  back  an  Alexandrine  on  the  anvil,  thought  that  to 
labour  at  metre  was  puerile,  fastidious,  and  useless.  He 

95 


PORTRAITS    OF. THE    DAY 

would  have  willingly  recompensed  with  a  bushel  of 
peas  those  who  succeeded  in  making  an  idea  pass 
through  the  narrow  ring  of  rhythm,  as  Alexander 
rewarded  the  Greek  who  was  skilled  in  throwing  from 
a  distance  bullets  through  a  ring.  Verse,  with  its 
fixed,  clean  form,  its  elliptical  speech  unfitted  for  mul- 
tiple detail,  seemed  to  him  an  obstacle  invented  pur- 
posely, a  superfluous  difficulty,  a  mnemonic  method 
adapted  to  the  use  of  primitive  days.  In  this  respect 
he  believed  very  much  as  did  Stendhal :  "  Can  the  fact 
that  a  work  was  written  while  the  author  was  hopping 
on  one  foot,  add  to  the  pleasure  the  work  gives  ?  " 

The  Romanticist  school  contained  within  itself  a 
few  adepts,  partisans  of  absolute  truth,  who  rejected 
verse  as  unnatural.  If  Talma  said,  "  I  do  not  want 
fine  verses,"  Beyle  said,  "  I  do  not  want  verse  at  all." 
That  was  at  bottom  Balzac's  feeling,  although  in  order 
to  appear  broad-minded,  comprehensive,  and  universal, 
he  sometimes  pretended  in  society  to  admire  poetry, 
just  as  ordinary  people  affect  to  care  enthusiastically 
for  music  which  bores  them  enormously.  He  was 
always  surprised  at  seeing  me  write  verse,  and  delight 
in  doing  it.  "  That  is  not  copy,"  he  would  say,  and 
any  esteem  which  he  felt  for  me  I  owed  to  my  prose. 

96 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

All  the  writers,  then  young,  who  formed  part  of  the 
literary  movement  represented  by  Hugo,  used,  like  the 
master,  the  lyre  or  the  pen.  Alfred  de  Vigny,  Sainte- 
Beuve,  Alfred  de  Musset,  spoke  indifferently  the  tongue 
of  gods  and  the  tongue  of  men ;  I  also  —  if  I  may 
name  myself  after  such  glorious  names,  —  possessed 
that  double  faculty  from  the  start.  It  is  always  easy 
for  poets  to  descend  to  prose ;  the  bird  may  walk  when 
it  chooses,  but  the  lion  cannot  fly.  Born  prose  writers 
never  rise  to  poetry,  however  poetical  they  may  be 
otherwise ;  the  gift  of  rhythmic  speech  is  a  peculiar 
one,  and  a  man  may  possess  it  without  being  neces- 
sarily a  great  genius,  while  it  is  often  refused  to  su- 
perior minds.  Among  the  proudest  of  those  who 
apparently  disdain  it,  more  than  one  is  unconsciously 
annoyed  at  not  possessing  it. 

Among  the  two  or  three  thousand  personages  of  the 
"  Comedie  humaine "  there  are  two  poets,  Canalis 
in  "  Modeste  Mignon,"  and  Lucien  de  Rubempre  in 
•"  Splendeurs  et  Miseres  des  courtisanes."  Balzac  has 
represented  both  in  no  very  favourable  way.  Canalis 
is  cold,  sterile,  small,  narrow-minded  ;  he  is  a  clever 
arranger  of  words,  a  maker  of  imitation  jewels,  who 
sets  paste  in  silver-gilt  and  makes  necklaces  of  imita- 

7  97 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

tion  pearls.  His  volumes,  with  numerous  leads,  broad 
margins,  and  wide  intervals,  contain  nothing  but  melo- 
dious nothingness,  monotonous  music  fit  only  to  make 
schoolgirls  sleep  or  dream.  Balzac,  who  usually  es- 
pouses warmly  the  interests  of  his  characters,  seems  to 
take  a  secret  pleasure  in  turning  Canalis  into  ridicule 
and  placing  him  in  embarrassing  positions.  He  riddles 
his  vanity  with  infinite  irony  and  sarcasm,  and  winds 
up  by  taking  from  him  Modeste  Mignon  and  her  great 
wealth,  to  give  her  to  Ernest  de  la  Briere.  This  end- 
ing, which  is  contrary  to  the  commencement  of  the 
story,  sparkles  with  veiled  malice  and  sly  mockery. 
Balzac  seems  to  be  personally  delighted  with  the  clever 
trick  which  he  has  played  on  Canalis.  He  thus  takes 
his  revenge  for  the  angels,  the  sylphs,  the  lakes,  the 
swans,  the  willows,  the  skiffs,  the  stars,  and  the  lyres 
which  the  poet  has  made  such  abundant  use  of. 

If  in  Canalis  we  have  the  sham  poet  who  saves  up 
his  slight  inspiration  and  dams  it  up  in  order  that  it 
may  flow,  foam,  and  sound  for  a  few  moments  so  as  to 
simulate  a  cascade  ;  the  clever  man  who  makes  all  his 
literary  successes,  laboriously  prepared,  serve  his  polit- 
ical ambition  ;  the  positive  man,  who  is  fond  of  money, 
degrees,  pensions,  and  honours,  in  spite  of  his  elegiac 

98 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

attitudes  and  his  posing  as  an  angel  who  regrets 
heaven  ;  on  the  other  hand  Lucien  de  Rubempre 
exhibits  to  us  the  idle,  frivolous,  careless,  fantastic, 
womanishly  nervous  poet,  who  is  incapable  of  persist- 
ent effort,  who  has  no  moral  strength,  who  lives  main- 
tained by  actresses  and  courtesans,  a  marionette  the 
strings  of  which  are  pulled  at  pleasure  by  the  terrible 
Vautrin,  who  hides  himself  under  the  pseudonym  of 
Carlos  Herrera.  It  is  true  that  in  spite  of  his  vices 
Lucien  is  seductive ;  Balzac  has  bestowed  wit,  beauty, 
youth,  and  elegance  upon  him.  Women  adore  him, 
but  he  ends  by  hanging  himself  in  prison.  Balzac  did 
all  he  could  to  bring  to  a  successful  issue  the  marriage 
of  Clotilde  de  Grandlieu  with  the  author  of  the  "  Mar- 
guerites," but  unfortunately  the  exigencies  of  morality 
were  in  the  way  ;  and  what  would  the  Faubourg  Saint- 
Germain  have  said  of  the  u  Comedie  humaine  "  if  the 
pupil  of  Jacques  Collin  the  convict  had  married  a 
duke's  daughter.  Since  we  are  speaking  of  the  author 
of  the  "  Marguerites,"  let  me  note  here  a  bit  of  infor- 
mation which  may  interest  bibliophiles.  The  few 
sonnets  which  Lucien  de  Rubempre  shows  as  a  sample 
of  his  volume  of  verse  to  the  publisher  Dauriat  are  not 
by  Balzac,  for  he  wrote  no  verse  and  asked  his  friends 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

for  any  which  he  happened  to  need.  The  sonnet  on 
the  Marguerite  is  by  Madame  de  Girardin,  the  son- 
net on  the  Camellia  by  Lassailly,  and  that  on  the 
Tulip  by  myself.  "  Modeste  Mignon  "  also  contains 
some  verses,  but  I  do  not  know  who  wrote  them. 

As  I  said  when  speaking  of  "  Mercadet,"  Balzac 
read  admirably,  and  he  was  good  enough  one  day  to 
read  to  me  some  of  my  own  verses.  He  recited 
among  others  "  La  Fontaine  du  Cimetiere."  Like  all 
prose  writers,  he  read  for  the  sake  of  the  sense  only, 
and  tried  to  conceal  the  rhythm  which  poets,  when 
they  recite  their  verses  aloud,  accentuate,  on  the  con- 
trary, in  a  fashion  unbearable  to  every  one  else,  but 
which  delights  them.  We  had  on  this  point  a  long 
discussion,  which  merely  ended,  as  is  always  the  case,  in 
each  of  us  being  more  set  in  his  own  private  opinion. 

The  great  literary  man  of  the  "  Comedie  humaine  " 
is  Daniel  d'Arthez,  a  serious  writer,  hard-working, 
long  buried,  before  he  makes  his  reputation,  in  deep 
studies  of  philosophy,  history,  and  linguistics.  Balzac 
dreaded  facility,  and  he  did  not  believe  that  a  work 
rapidly  written  could  be  good.  For  this  reason  he  en- 
tertained singular  repugnance  towards  newspaper  writ- 
ing, and  he  considered  time  and  talent  given  up  to  it 

100 


HONORS     DE     BALZAC 

as  wasted  ;  nor  did  he  fancy  newspaper  writers  much 
more,  and  although  himself  so  great  a  critic,  he  despised 
criticism.  The  very  unflattering  portraits  which  he 
has  drawn  of  Etienne  Lousteau,  Nathan,  Vernisset, 
Androche  Finot,  fairly  represent  his  real  opinion  of 

>•» 

the  press.  Emile  Blondet,  introduced  into  that  bad 
company  to  represent  the  good  writer,  is  recompensed 
for  his  articles  for  the  imaginary  "  Debats "  of  the 
"  Comedie  humaine "  by  a  rich  marriage  with  a  gen- 
eral's widow,  and  is  thus  enabled  to  give  up  newspaper 
work. 

Balzac,  besides,  never  bestowed  a  thought  on  the 
newspaper  when  working.  He  took  his  novels  to  mag- 
azines and  to  daily  papers  just  as  they  were  written, 
without  preparing  any  breaks  or  skilfully  suspended 
sentences  at  the  end  of  each  instalment  so  that  readers 
should  desire  to  know  the  continuation.  He  cut  up 
his  material  into  slices  of  about  the  same  length,  and 
sometimes  a  description  of  an  arm-chair,  begun  in  one 
issue,  was  not  finished  until  the  next  day.  He  rightly 
refused  to  divide  his  work  into  little  tableaux  like  those 
of  a  drama  or  a  vaudeville  ;  he  thought  merely  of  the 
finished  book.  That  fashion  of  working  often  pre- 
vented the  immediate  success  which  newspaperdom 

101 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

requires  of  the  authors  it  employs.  Eugene  Sue  and 
Alexandre  Dumas  were  more  frequently  victorious  than 
Balzac  in  those  daily  battles  which  then  delighted  the 
newspapers.  He  did  not  win  any  of  that  immense  pop- 
ularity which  rewarded  the  "  Mysteries  of  Paris  "  and 
"  The  Wandering  Jew,"  "  The  Three  Musketeers," 
and  "  Monte  Cristo."  "  Les  Paysans,"  a  masterpiece, 
even  caused  a  great  number  of  subscribers  to  the 
"  Presse,"  in  which  the  first  part  appeared,  to  give  up 
the  paper ;  the  publication  of  the  work  had  to  be 
stopped.  Every  day  came  letters  asking  that  the 
novel  be  brought  to  a  conclusion,  —  Balzac  was 
thought  wearisome.  The  great  idea  of  the  author 
of  the  u  Comedie  humaine  "  had  not  yet  been  grasped. 
It  was  to  take  modern  society,  and  to  write  about  Paris 
and  our  days  that  book  which  unfortunately  no  civilisa- 
tion of  antiquity  has  left  to  us.  The  complete  edition 
of  the  "  Comedie  humaine,"  by  collecting  the  scattered 
works,  brought  out  the  philosophical  purpose  of  the 
writer ;  from  that  moment  Balzac  grew  considerably 
in  public  opinion,  and  at  last  it  ceased  to  consider  him 
as  "  the  most  fertile  of  our  romancers,"  —  a  stereo- 
typed phrase  which  irritated  him  as  much  as  being 
called  "  the  author  of  '  Eugenie  Grandet.'  " 

IO2 


HONORS    DE    BALZAC 

Many  a  criticism  has  been  written  on  Balzac,  he 
has  been  talked  over  in  many  a  way,  but  this  point  — 
the  absolute  modernness  of  his  genius,  in  my  opinion 
the  most  characteristic,  —  has  not  been  dwelt  upon. 
Balzac  owes  nothing  whatever  to  antiquity ;  the 
Greeks  and  Romans  do  not  exist  for  him  ;  he  does 
not  need,  therefore,  to  call  for  freedom  from  them. 
In  the  make-up  of  his  talent  there  is  no  trace  of 
Homer,  of  Virgil,  of  Horace,  not  even  of  the  "Viris 
Illustribus,"  —  no  one  was  ever  less  classical. 

Balzac,  like  Gavarni,  saw  his  contemporaries ;  but 
in  art  the  highest  difficulty  is  to  paint  what  one  be- 
holds. It  is  quite  possible  to  go  through  one's  times 
without  beholding  them,  and  that  is  what  many  great 
minds  have  done.  Nothing  seems  simpler,  and  yet 
nothing  is  harder  than  to  be  of  one's  own  time ;  to 
wear  neither  green  nor  blue  glasses,  to  think  with  one's 
brain,  to  make  use  of  the  speech  of  the  day  and  not  to 
reproduce  in  centons  the  phrases  of  one's  predecessors. 
Now  Balzac  possessed  that  very  rare  merit.  The  ages 
have  a  perspective  of  their  own  and  a  distance  of  their 
own ;  then  the  great  masses  stand  out,  the  lines  be- 
come clear,  the  troublesome  details  vanish  ;  by  the 
help  of  classical  remembrances  and  of  the  harmonious 

103 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

names  of  antiquity,  the  meanest  of  rhetoricians  can 
turn  out  a  tragedy,  a  poem,  a  historical  study.  But  to 
find  yourself  in  the  crowd,  elbowed  by  it,  and  yet  to 
catch  its  aspect,  to  follow  its  currents,  to  distinguish 
personalities,  to  draw  the  faces  of  so  many  different 
beings,  to  exhibit  the  secret  motives  of  their  actions, 
—  that  requires  a  very  special  genius,  and  the  author  of 
the  "  Comedie  humaine  "  possessed  that  genius  to  a 
degree  which  no  one  has  equalled  before,  and  probably 
no  one  ever  will  equal. 

This  deep  understanding  of  modern  things  made 
Balzac,  I  must  say,  rather  insensible  to  plastic  beauty ; 
he  read  with  careless  eye  the  marmorean  strophes  in 
which  Greek  art  sang  the  perfection  of  the  human  form, 
in  the  Greek  Museum  he  looked  at  the  Venus  of  Milo 
without  any  great  pleasure ;  but  the  fair  Parisian  who 
stopped  in  front  of  the  immortal  statue,  wrapped  in  her 
long  cashmere  shawl  which  fell  without  a  fold  from 
the  neck  to  the  bottom  of  the  skirt,  wearing  a  bon- 
net with  a  Chantilly  veil,  gloved  with  neat  Jouvin 
gloves,  showing  from  under  the  hem  of  her  flounced 
dress  the  varnished  tip  of  her  shoe,  made  his  eye 
sparkle  with  delight.  He  analysed  her  coquettish 
ways,  he  enjoyed  to  the  full  her  skilled  graces,  think- 

104 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

ing,  as  she  did,  that  the  goddess  was  rather  thick- 
waisted  and  would  not  show  to  advantage  in  the  draw- 
ing-rooms of  Mesdames  de  Beauseant,  de  Listomere, 
or  d'Espard.  Ideal  beauty,  with  its  serene,  clean  lines, 
was  too  simple,  cold,  and  plain  for  this  complex,  rich, 
diversified  genius.  He  says  somewhere,  "  A  man 
must  be  a  Raphael  to  paint  many  Virgins."  Charac- 
ter pleased  him  more  than  style,  and  he  preferred 
physiognomy  to  beauty.  In  his  portraits  of  women  he 
never  idealised,  but  put  a  sign,  a  wrinkle,  a  fold,  a  spot 
of  rose,  a  softened,  tired  corner,  a  vein  too  apparent, 
or  some  detail  which  indicated  the  wear  and  tear  of 
life,  and  which  a  poet,  painting  the  same  face,  would 
have  unquestionably  effaced,  though  no  doubt  he  would 
have  been  wrong  to  do  so. 

I  have  not  the  least  intention  of  criticising  Balzac 
on  this  point,  for  that  defect  is  his  chief  quality.  He 
accepted  no  mythologies  or  traditions,  and,  happily  for 
us,  was  unacquainted  with  that  ideal  form  of  the  verse 
of  poets,  of  the  marbles  of  Greece  and  Rome,  and  of 
the  paintings  of  the  Renaissance,  which  interposes  be- 
tween the  eye  of  the  artist  and  reality.  He  loved  the 
woman  of  our  day  such  as  she  is,  and  not  a  pale  statue. 
He  loved  her  for  her  virtues,  her  vices,  her  fancies, 

105 


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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

and  her  shawls,  her  dresses  and  bonnets,  and  followed 
her  through  life  far  beyond  that  point  on  the  road 
where  love  abandons  her;  he  prolonged  her  youth  by 
several  years ;  he  gave  her  new  springtimes  and  Indian 
summers ;  he  gilded  her  sunsets  with  most  splendid 
beams.  We  are  so  classical  in  France  that  even  after 
two  thousand  years  people  have  not  perceived  that 
roses  in  our  climate  do  not  bloom  in  April,  as  in  the 
descriptions  of  the  poets  of  antiquity,  but  in  June,  and 
that  our  women  begin  to  be  beautiful  at  the  age  when 
those  of  Greece,  more  precocious,  ceased  to  be  so. 
How  many  a  charming  type  he  has  imagined  or  re- 
produced ;  Madame  Firmiani,  the  Duchess  de  Mau- 
frigneuse,  the  Princess  de  Cadignan,  Madame  de 
Mortsauf,  Lady  Dudley,  the  Duchess  de  Langeais, 
Madame  Jules,  Modeste  Mignon,  Diane  de  Chaulieu, 
to  say  nothing  of  the  middle-class  women,  the  grisettes 
and  the  ladies  of  his  demi-monde. 

And  how  well  he  loved  our  modern  Paris,  the 
beauty  of  which  the  amateurs  of  local  colour  and  pic- 
turesqueness  in  his  day  appreciated  so  little  !  He  trav- 
ersed it  in  every  direction  by  night  and  by  day;  there 
was  not  a  blind  lane,  not  a  smelly  passageway,  not  a 
narrow,  muddy,  black  street  which  did  not  become 

1 06 


HONORE     DE    BALZAC 

under  his  pen  an  etching  worthy  of  Rembrandt,  full  of 
shadows,  swarming  with  mystery  in  which  shows 
faintly  the  trembling  dot  of  light.  Wealth  and  wretch- 
edness, pleasure  and  suffering,  shame  and  glory,  beauty 
and  ugliness,  —  he  knew  every  bit  of  his  beloved  town. 
Paris  was  to  him  an  enormous,  hybrid,  formidable 
monster,  a  polypus  with  a  hundred  thousand  tentacles, 
which  he  listened  to  and  watched  live,  and  which 
formed  in  his  eyes  one  vast  individuality.  On  this 
point  the  reader  should  peruse  the  marvellous  pages  at 
the  beginning  of  "  La  Fille  aux  yeux  d'or,"  in  which 
Balzac,  trespassing  upon  the  musician's  art,  has  sought, 
as  if  he  were  writing  a  symphony  for  a  great  orches- 
tra, to  bring  out  the  sound  of  all  the  voices,  all  the 
sobs,  all  the  cries,  all  the  rumours,  all  the  groans  of 
Paris  at  work. 

It  was  from  this  modernism,  on  which  I  dwell  pur- 
posely, that  arose,  without  his  suspecting  it,  the  difficulty 
of  labour  which  Balzac  felt  in  the  accomplishment  of 
his  work.  The  French  language,  as  wrought  out  by 
the  Classics  of  the  seventeenth  century,  is  fitted,  if  it  is 
desired  to  conform  to  it,  to  express  general  ideas  only, 
and  to  paint  conventional  figures  amid  vague  surround- 
ings. To  express  the  innumerable  details  of  charac- 

107 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

ters,  forms,  architecture,  styles  of  furniture,  Balzac 
was  obliged  to  make  for  himself  a  special  tongue  com- 
posed of  technical  terms,  of  the  slang  of  science,  of 
the  studio,  of  the  theatre,  of  the  circus  itself.  Every 
word  which  had  a  meaning  was  welcomed,  and  the 
sentence,  in  order  to  receive  it,  opened  an  insert,  a 
parenthesis,  and  complacently  lengthened  itself  out. 
That  is  what  made  superficial  critics  say  that  Balzac 
was  no  writer.  He  possessed,  although  he  did  not 
think  so,  a  style,  and  a  very  beautiful  style,  the  neces- 
sary, inevitable,  mathematical  style  of  his  ideas. 

VI 

No  one  can  pretend  to  write  a  complete  biography  of 
Balzac.  Any  close  intimacy  with  him  was  necessarily 
broken  into  by  lapses,  absences,  and  disappearances. 
Work  absolutely  ordered  Balzac's  life,  and  if — as  he 
says  himself  with  an  accent  of  touching  feeling,  in  a 
letter  to  his  sister  —  he  unhesitatingly  sacrificed  to 
that  jealous  god  the  joys  and  distractions  of  life,  it 
cost  him  somewhat  to  give  up  every  intercourse  which 
had  brought  some  friendship.  To  reply  in  a  few 
words  to  a  long  letter  became  for  him,  in  the  course 
of  his  overwhelming  labours,  a  piece  of  prodigality 

108 


HONORE    DE     BALZAC 

which  he  could  rarely  indulge  in.  He  was  the  slave 
of  his  work,  and  a  willing  slave.  He  had,  with  a  very 
kind,  tender  heart,  the  egotism  of  a  great  worker. 
And  who  could  have  possibly  thought  of  being  an- 
noyed at  his  forced  negligence  and  his  apparent  forget- 
fulness,  on  beholding  the  results  of  his  flights  and  his 
seclusions  ?  When,  having  thoroughly  finished  his 
work,  he  reappeared,  you  would  have  sworn  that  he 
had  left  you  but  the  night  before,  and  he  resumed  the 
interrupted  conversation  just  as  though  six  months  and 
sometimes  more  had  not  passed  by.  He  made  trips 
through  France  to  study  the  localities  in  which  he  placed 
his  "  Scenes  de  la  Vie  de  Province,"  and  withdrew  to 
the  house  of  a  friend  in  Touraine  or  Charente,  finding 
there  the  peace  which  his  creditors  did  not  always 
allow  him  to  enjoy  in  Paris.  After  some  great  work 
he  occasionally  allowed  himself  a  somewhat  longer  trip 
into  Germany,  Upper  Italy,  or  Switzerland,  but  these 
rapid  excursions,  troubled  by  the  recollection  of  notes 
falling  due  and  contracts  to  be  kept  or  of  insufficient 
means,  fatigued  him  perhaps  rather  more  than  they 
rested  him.  His  vast  glance  took  in  the  heavens,  the 
horizons,  mountains,  landscapes,  monuments,  houses, 
and  interiors,  and  intrusted  them  to  that  comprehensive 

109 


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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

and  mighty  memory  which  never  failed  him.  Greater 
in  this  respect  than  descriptive  poets,  Balzac  saw  man 
at  the  same  time  as  nature ;  he  studied  faces,  manners, 
passions,  characters  with  the  same  glance  that  he  studied 
cities,  costumes,  and  furniture.  Just  as  the  smallest 
fragment  of  bone  was  sufficient  for  Cuvier,  so  a  detail 
sufficed  him  to  imagine  and  to  reconstitute  accurately 
an  individual  whom  he  had  caught  sight  of  as  he 
passed.  Balzac's  talent  for  observation  has  been  often 
and  rightly  praised,  but  great  as  it  was,  it  is  not  to  be 
supposed  that  the  author  of  the  "  Comedie  humaine  " 
always  drew  his  portraits,  so  strictly  true,  from  nature. 
His  method  in  no  wise  resembled  that  of  Henri 
Monnier,  who  followed  in  real  life  some  individual 
in  order  to  sketch  him  with  pen  and  pencil,  taking 
down  his  least  gestures,  noting  his  most  insignificant 
remarks  so  as  to  obtain  at  one  and  the  same  time  a 
photograph  and  a  page  of  shorthand  notes.  Balzac, 
absorbed  most  of  the  time  in  his  work,  could  not 
materially  observe  the  two  thousand  characters  which 
play  their  part  in  his  comedy  in  one  hundred  acts ;  but 
every  man,  when  he  possesses  the  inner  sight,  contains 
humanity,  and  becomes  a  microcosm  in  which  nothing 
is  lacking.  He  has  —  not  always,  but  often  —  ob- 

•    no 


HQNQRE    DE    BALZAC 

served  within  himself  the  numerous  types  which  live 
in  his  work.  That  is  why  they  are  complex,  —  no 
one  can  absolutely  live  another  man's  life;  in  such 
a  case  there  are  motives  which  remain  obscure,  un- 
known details,  actions  of  which  one  loses  track. 
Even  in  the  most  faithful  portraits  there  must  be  some 
creation.  So  Balzac  created  much  more  than  he  saw, 
yet  his  remarkable  faculties  as  an  anatomist  and  a 
physiologist  have  merely  served  the  poet  in  him,  just 
as  the  assistant  serves  the  professor  to  whom  he  hands 
the  materials  needed  for  a  demonstration. 

Perhaps  this  is  the  place  to  define  truth  as  under- 
stood by  Balzac.  In  these  days  of  realism,  it  is  well 
to  be  explicit  on  this  point.  Truth  in  art  is  not  truth 
in  nature;  everything  represented  by  means  of  art 
necessarily  contains  some  small  amount  of  conven- 
tionality. You  may  reduce  it  as  much  as  you  like,  it 
still  exists,  even  if  it  be  merely  perspective  in  painting, 
and  language  in  literature.  Balzac  brings  out,  en- 
larges, heightens,  cuts  away,  adds,  shades,  lights  up, 
throws  into  the  distance  or  draws  near  men  and  things 
according  to  the  effect  he  seeks  to  produce ;  he  is 
truthful  no  doubt,  but  with  the  additions  and  the  sacri- 
fices called  for  by  art.  He  prepares  rich,  dark  back- 

iii 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

grounds  for  his  luminous  figures ;  he  sets  his  sombre 
figures  against  light  backgrounds.  Like  Rembrandt 
he  skilfully  places  as  required  the  high  light  on  the 
brow  or  the  nose  of  the  character.  Sometimes  he 
obtains  fantastic  and  eccentric  results  in  his  descrip- 
tions by  placing,  without  saying  a  word,  a  microscope 
under  the  reader's  eyes  ;  then  the  details  appear  with 
unnatural  sharpness,  with  exaggerated  minuteness,  with 
incomprehensible  and  formidable  enlargements;  the 
tissues,  the  bracts,  the  pores,  the  villi,  the  grain,  the 
fibres,  the  capillary  ducts,  assume  an  enormous  impor- 
tance, and  turn  a  face  insignificant  to  the  naked  eye 
into  a  sort  of  chimerical  mask  as  amazing  as  those 
sculptured  under  the  cornices  of  the  Pont  Neuf  and 
vermiculated  by  time.  Characters  also  are  carried  to 
extremes,  as  is  proper  in  types.  If  Baron  Hulot  is 
a  libertine,  he  is  also  the  incarnation  of  lust ;  he  is 
both  a  man  and  a  vice,  both  a  personality  and  an 
abstraction.  He  unites  in  himself  all  the  scattered 
features  of  such  a  character.  A  writer  of  less  genius 
would  have  drawn  a  portrait;  Balzac  has  created  a 
type.  Men  do  not  have  as  many  muscles  as  Michael 
Angelo  gives  them  in  order  to  suggest  the  idea  of 
strength.  Balzac  too  is  full  of  this  useful  exaggera- 

112 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

tion,  of  those  heavy  strokes  which  bring  out  and  sup- 
port the  outline.  He  imagines,  as  he  copies,  like  a 
master,  and  he  impresses  his  own  touch  on  everything. 

As  this  is  not  a  literary  criticism  but  a  biographical 
study  I  am  writing,  I  shall  not  carry  these  remarks 
farther.  It  is  sufficient  to  make  the  suggestion. 
Balzac,  whom  the  Realistic  school  seems  to  desire  to 
claim  as  its  leader,  has  no  connection  with  its 
tendencies. 

Unlike  certain  great  literary  men  who  feed  on  their 
own  genius  alone,  Balzac  wrote  a  great  deal  and  with 
prodigious  rapidity.  He  was  fond  of  books  and  had 
brought  together  a  fine  library,  which  he  intended  to 
leave  to  his  native  city,  a  purpose  which  the  indif- 
ference of  his  townsmen  towards  him  caused  him 
to  abandon  later.  He  absorbed  in  a  few  days  the 
voluminous  works  of  Swedenborg,  which  his  mother 
owned,  —  she  was  at  that  time  rather  preoccupied  with 
mysticism.  That  piece  of  reading  gave  us  u  Seraphita- 
Seraphitus,"  one  of  the  most  amazing  products  of 
modern  literature.  Never  did  Balzac  approach  nearer 
ideal  beauty  than  he  did  in  that  book.  The  climb  up 
the  mountain  is  so  ethereal,  supernatural,  and  luminous 
that  it  fairly  lifts  you  away  from  earth.  There  are  two 

8  113 


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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

colours  only  employed,  —  azure  blue  and  snow  white, 
with  a  few  pearly  tones  for  shadows.  I  know  nothing 
more  exquisite  than  the  opening.  The  description  of 
Norway  with  its  fiords  seen  from  above  is  dazzling  and 
turns  one's  head. 

"  Louis  Lambert  "  also  shows  traces  of  the  reading 
of  Swedenborg  j  but  soon  Balzac,  who  had  borrowed 
the  eagle  pinions  of  the  mystics  to  soar  in  the  infinite, 
returned  to  the  earth  we  inhabit,  although  his  robust 
lungs  could  have  breathed  for  any  length  of  time  that 
subtile  air  deadly  to  the  weak  ;  he  abandoned  the  world 
beyond  after  that  flight  and  returned  to  real  life.  Per- 
haps his  splendid  genius  would  have  vanished  too  soon, 
had  he  continued  to  rise  within  the  boundless  heights  of 
mysticism,  and  we  ought  to  count  ourselves  happy  that 
he  was  satisfied  with  "  Louis  Lambert  "  and  "  Sera- 
phita-Seraphitus,"  which  sufficiently  represent  in  the 
"  Comedie  humaine  "  the  supernatural  side,  and  which 
open  a  wide  enough  door  into  the  invisible  world. 

Let  me  now  pass  to  more  intimate  details.  The 
great  Goethe  had  a  horror  of  three  things, —  one  of  them 
was  tobacco  smoke.  Like  the  Jupiter  of  the  German 
poetic  Olympus,  Balzac  could  not  bear  tobacco  under 
any  form  whatever;  he  anathematised  pipes  and  pro- 

114 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

scribed  cigars;  he  did  not  tolerate  even  the  smallest 
Spanish  cigarette.  The  Asiatic  hookah  alone  found 
favour  in  his  eyes,  and  even  that  he  tolerated  merely 
as  a  curious  trifle  and  on  account  of  its  local  colour. 
In  his  philippics  against  Nicot's  weed  he  did  not 
imitate  the  doctor  who,  during  a  dissertation  upon 
the  evils  of  snuff,  never  ceased  to  take  great  pinches 
from  a  big  snuffbox  placed  near  him.  Balzac  never 
smoked ;  his  "  Theory  of  Stimulants  "  contains  a  reg- 
ular indictment  against  tobacco,  and  I  have  no  doubt 
that,  had  he  been  a  sultan  like  Amurat,  he  would 
have  caused  all  obstinate  smokers  and  those  who 
had  relapsed  to  be  beheaded.  His  great  predilection 
was  for  coffee,  which  did  him  so  much  harm,  and 
perchance  killed  him,  although  he  was  built  to  live 
a  hundred  years. 

Was  Balzac  right  or  wrong?  Is  tobacco,  as  he  main- 
tained, a  deadly  poison,  and  does  it  intoxicate  those 
whom  it  does  not  turn  into  brutes  ?  Is  it  the  Western 
opium  which  dulls  will  and  mind  ?  That  is  a  question 
I  cannot  solve,  but  I  shall  name  here  a  few  famous 
persons  of  our  day,  some  of  whom  smoked  and  others 
who  did  not.  Goethe  and  Heine,  singularly  enough, 
Germans  though  they  were,  did  not  smoke.  Byron 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

smoked ;  but  Hugo  does  not,  any  more  than  Alexandre 
Dumas  senior;  on  the  other  hand,  Alfred  de  Musset, 
Eugene  Sue,  George  Sand,  Merimee,  Paul  de  Saint- 
Victor,  Emile  Augier,  Ponsard  smoked  and  smoke  still, 
and  yet  they  are  not  quite  fools. 

This  aversion,  besides,  was  shared  by  nearly  all  the 
men  born  with  our  century  or  somewhat  earlier.  At 
that  time  only  sailors  or  soldiers  smoked;  women 
fainted  at  the  smell  of  a  pipe  or  a  cigar.  They  have 
progressed  since  then,  and  more  than  one  pair  of  rosy 
lips  lovingly  presses  the  gold  mouthpiece  of  a  puro  in  a 
boudoir  changed  into  a  smoking-room.  Dowagers  and 
turbaned  mothers  have  alone  preserved  their  old  an- 
tipathy, and  stoically  behold  their  drawing-rooms 
deserted  by  refractory  youth. 

Every  time  that  Balzac  is  obliged  for  the  verisimili- 
tude of  his  story  to  allow  one  of  his  characters  to 
indulge  in  this  horrible  habit,  his  concise,  disdainful 
sentence  exhibits  secret  blame.  "As  for  du  Marsay," 
he  says,  u  he  was  busy  smoking  cigars,  — "  and  he 
must  have  been  very  fond  of  that  condottiere  of  dandy- 
ism, to  allow  him  to  smoke  in  his  work. 

A  delicate-mannered  woman,  no  doubt,  inspired 
Balzac  with  that  aversion ;  that  is  a  point  I  cannot 

116 


HQNORE    DE    BALZAC 

clear  up.     What  is  certain  is  that  the  Revenue  never 
made  a  penny  by  him. 

Talking  of  women,  Balzac,  who  described  them  so 
well,  must  certainly  have  known  them.  In  one  of  the 
letters  he  wrote  to  his  sister,  Madame  de  Surville,  when 
he  was  still  young  and  quite  unknown,  he  states  the 
ideal  hope  of  his  life  in  two  words,  —  to  be  famous  and 
beloved.  The  first  part  of  the  programme  —  which 
every  artist  has  marked  out  for  himself — was  most 
fully  realised.  Was  the  second  fulfilled  also  ?  The 
opinion  of  the  most  intimate  friends  of  Balzac  is  that 
his  loves  were  at  the  most  platonic,  but  Madame  de 
Surville  smiles  at  the  suggestion,  with  a  smile  full 
of  feminine  finesse  and  of  modest  reticence.  She 
maintains  that  her  brother  was  uncommonly  discreet, 
and  that  if  he  had  chosen  to  speak,  he  could  have  told 
many  things.  No  doubt  that  is  true,  and  Balzac's 
strong-box  must  have  contained  more  notes  written  in 
delicate,  sloping  handwriting,  than  the  lacquered  coffers 
of  Canalis.  One  scents  woman  in  his  work,  odor 
dl  femina.  When  one  penetrates  into  it,  one  hears, 
behind  the  doors  which  close  on  the  steps  of  the  secret 
staircase,  the  rustle  of  silk  and  the  creaking  of  shoes. 
The  semicircular,  padded  drawing-room  of  the  rue  des 

117 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

Batailles,  of  which  I  have  quoted  the  description 
inserted  by  the  author  in  the  "  Fille  aux  yeux  d'or," 
did  not  remain  absolutely  virgin,  as  many  of  us 
supposed  it  did.  In  the  whole  course  of  my  intimacy 
with  him,  —  which  lasted  from  1836  to  the  day  of  his 
death,  —  once  alone  did  Balzac  allude,  in  the  most 
respectful  words,  to  an  attachment  of  his  early  youth. 
Even  then  he  told  me  only  the  first  name  of  the 
woman,  whose  remembrance,  after  so  many  years,  still 
brought  tears  to  his  eyes.  If  he  had  told  me  any  more, 
I  should  certainly  not  violate  his  confidence.  The 
genius  of  a  great  writer  belongs  to  the  world,  but 
his  heart  is  his  own.  I  merely  touch,  by  the  way,  on 
this  tender  and  delicate  side  of  Balzac's  life,  because 
all  I  have  to  say  about  it  is  to  his  honour.  His  re- 
serve and  his  mystery  are  characteristic  of  a  well-bred 
man  ;  if  he  was  beloved,  as  he  wished  to  be  in  his 
youthful  dreams,  the  world,  at  least,  has  never  known 
aught  of  it. 

Do  not  imagine  that  on  this  account  Balzac  was 
austere  and  chaste  in  his  speech.  The  author  of  the 
"  Contes  drolatiques  "  was  too  well  acquainted  with 
Rabelais,  and  too  much  after  the  fashion  of  Pantagruel, 
to  avoid  jokes ;  he  knew  good  stones  and  he  invented 

118 


HQNORE    DE    BALZAC 

others.  His  broad  jokes,  interlarded  with  gallic  crudi- 
ties, would  have  made  horrified  cant  cry  out  "  Shock- 
ing !  "  but  his  laughing,  talkative  lips  were  sealed  like 
the  tomb  when  a  serious  feeling  was  in  question.  He 
scarcely  allowed  his  best  friends  to  guess  at  his  love 
for  a  distinguished  foreign  lady,  —  a  love  which  may 
be  spoken  of  since  it  was  crowned  by  marriage.  It 
was  to  that  passion,  which  he  had  felt  for  a  long  time, 
that  his  distant  excursions  were  due,  although  until  the 
very  last  day,  the  object  of  them  remained  a  mystery 
to  his  friends. 

Absorbed  in  his  work,  Balzac  did  not  think  of  trying 
the  drama  until  very  late.  Public  opinion  in  general 
considered  him  —  wrongly,  I  think  —  not  well  fitted 
for  it,  on  the  score  of  a  few  more  or  less  risky  at- 
tempts of  his.  The  man  who  created  so  many  types, 
analysed  so  many  characters,  gave  life  to  so  many  people, 
was  bound  to  succeed  on  the  stage.  But  as  I  have 
said,  Balzac  was  not  spontaneous,  and  the  proofs  of  a 
drama  cannot  be  corrected.  If  he  had  lived,  he  would 
unquestionably  have  found  his  right  line  and  obtained 
success  after  writing  a  dozen  plays.  The  "  Maratre," 
played  at  the  Theatre  Historique,  was  very  nearly 
a  masterpiece ;  u  Mercadet,"  slightly  arranged  by  a 

119 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

clever  adapter,  obtained  a  long  posthumous  success 
at  the  Gymnase. 

I  am  bound  to  say,  however,  that  what  induced  him 
to  make  the  attempt  was  rather  the  hope  of  earning  a 
large  sum  which  would  free  him  at  once  from  his  finan- 
cial embarrassments,  than  a  genuine  vocation.  Every 
one  knows  that  a  play  is  much  more  profitable  than 
a  book.  A  series  of  performances  from  which  one 
draws  rather  large  profits  soon  produces  by  accumula- 
tion considerable  sums ;  if  the  work  of  combination  is 
greater,  the  material  labour  is  less.  It  takes  several 
dramas  to  fill  a  volume,  and  while  you  are  walking  or 
resting  idly  with  your  slippers  on,  the  footlights  are 
lighted,  the  stage  is  set,  the  actors  declaim  and  gesticu- 
late, and  you  find  you  have  made  more  money  than  by 
scribbling  away  for  a  week,  painfully  bowed  over  your 
desk.  Some  melodramas  have  brought  in  more  to  their 
authors  than  "  Notre-Dame  de  Paris "  did  to  Victor 
Hugo  or  the  "  Parents  pauvres "  to  Balzac. 

It  is  curious  that  Balzac,  who  thought  out  his  novels 
elaborately  and  corrected  them  with  such  obstinate 
minuteness,  seemed,  when  it  was  a  question  of  writing 
a  play,  seized  with  a  fever  of  rapidity.  He  not  only 
did  not  re-write  his  plays  eight  or  ten  times  as  he  did 

1 20 


HONOR E    DE    BALZAC 

his  novels,  he  did  not  really  write  them  at  all.  Scarcely 
had  he  fixed  upon  his  plan  than  he  appointed  a  day  for 
the  reading  and  called  upon  his  friends  to  work  up  the 
matter.  Orliac,  Lassailly,  Laurent-Jan,  myself,  and 
others  have  often  been  summoned  in  the  middle  of  the 
night  or  at  extraordinarily  early  hours.  In  such  cases 
we  had  to  drop  everything,  for  every  moment's  delay 
caused  the  loss  of  millions. 

An  urgent  note  from  Balzac  summoned  me  one  day 
to  repair  at  once  to  the  rue  de  Richelieu,  where  he  had 
a  room  in  the  house  of  Buisson  the  tailor.  I  found 
Balzac  robed  in  his  monkish  gown  and  stamping  with 
impatience  on  the  blue  and  white  carpet  of  a  dainty 
little  attic,  the  walls  of  which  were  hung  with  Carmel- 
ite chintz  with  blue  ornaments,  for  in  spite  of  his  ap- 
parent neglectfulness,  he  had  the  instinct  of  interior 
arrangements  and  always  prepared  a  comfortable  nest 
for  his  laborious  night-watches  ;  in  none  of  his  lodg- 
ings did  one  meet  with  that  picturesque  disorder  so  dear 
to  the  artist. 

"  At  last,  here  is  Theo  ! "  he  exclaimed  as  he  saw 
me.  "  You  slow  coach,  you  tardigrade,  you  sloth ! 
Why  do  you  not  hurry  up  ?  Why  do  you  not  make 
haste  ?  You  ought  to  have  been  here  an  hour  ago. 

121 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

To-morrow  I  have  to  read  to  Horrel  a  great  drama  in 
five  acts." 

"  Oh  !  and  you  want  my  advice  ?  "  I  replied,  as  I 
settled  myself  in  an  arm-chair  after  the  fashion  of  a 
man  who  makes  ready  to  submit  to  a  long  course  of 
reading. 

Balzac  divined  my  thought  by  my  attitude,  and  he 
said  in  the  quietest  possible  way,  "  The  play  is  not 
yet  written." 

"  The  devil !  "  said  I.  "  Well,  you  will  have  to 
put  off  the  reading  for  six  weeks." 

"No;  we  shall  knock  up  the  dramorama  together 
in  order  to  get  the  pay.  I  have  a  heavy  note  to  meet 
at  such  a  date." 

u  It  is  impossible  to  do  it  before  to-morrow,  —  there 
would  not  be  time  to  copy  it." 

u  This  is  how  I  have  arranged  matters :  you  are  to 
write  one  act,  Orliac  another,  Laurent-Jan  the  third, 
de  Belloy  the  fourth,  and  I  the  fifth  ;  and  I  shall  read 
at  noon  as  agreed  upon.  An  act  in  a  drama  does  not 
have  more  than  four  or  five  hundred  lines ;  you  can 
write  four  or  five  hundred  lines  of  dialogue  during  a 
day  and  a  night." 

"  Tell  me  the  subject,   the   plan,   sketch   the   char- 

122 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

acters  in  a  few  words,  and  I  will  set  to  work,"  I  re- 
plied, pretty  well  upset. 

"  Ah  !  "  he  cried  with  an  air  of  superb  weariness  and 
magnificent  disdain,  "  if  I  have  to  tell  you  the  subject, 
it  will  never  be  done." 

I  had  not  thought  I  was  indiscreet  in  putting  such  a 
question,  which  struck  Balzac  as  perfectly  idle. 

Managing  with  much  difficulty  to  get  some  notion 
of  the  plot,  I  set  to  work  to  dash  off  a  scene,  a  few 
words  alone  of  which  remained  in  the  final  work, 
which  was  not  read  the  next  day,  as  will  readily  be 
believed.  I  do  not  know  what  the  other  collaborators 
did,  but  the  only  one  who  seriously  set  to  work  was 
Laurent-Jan,  to  whom  the  play  is  dedicated.  That  play 
was  "  Vautrin."  Every  one  knows  that  the  dynastic 
and  pyramidal  tuft  of  hair  which  Frederick  Lemaitre 
bethought  himself  of  wearing  in  his  disguise  as  a  Mexi- 
can general,  drew  down  upon  the  play  the  anger  of  the 
authorities.  "  Vautrin,"  interdicted,  was  performed  but 
once,  and  poor  Balzac  was  like  the  milk-maid  with  her 
jars  upset ;  the  prodigious  sums  which  he  had  figured  as 
the  probable  profits  of  his  drama  melted  into  ciphers  ; 
which  did  not  prevent  his  refusing  in  a  dignified 
fashion  the  compensation  offered  by  the  ministry. 

123 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

At  the  beginning  of  this  study  I  have  spoken  occa- 
sionally of  the  dandiacal  fancies  exhibited  occasionally 
by  Balzac;  I  spoke  of  his  blue  coat  with  buttons  of 
massive  gold,  his  huge  cane  ornamented  with  a  mass 
of  turquoises,  his  appearances  in  society  and  in  the  in- 
fernal box.  This  splendour  lasted  but  for  a  time,  and 
Balzac  recognised  that  he  was  not  fitted  to  play  the 
part  of  Alcibiades  or  Brummel.  He  could  be  met, 
especially  in  the  morning  when  he  hastened  to  the 
printing  office  to  carry  copy  and  to  fetch  away  proofs, 
in  an  infinitely  less  superb  dress.  Then  he  wore  a 
green  hunting-jacket  with  brass  buttons  in  the  shape 
of  foxes'  heads,  trousers  with  straps,  checkered  gray 
and  black,  tucked  into  big  shoes,  a  red  kerchief  twisted 
rope  fashion  around  his  neck,  a  dismal  hat  brushed  the 
wrong  way,  with  a  blue  band  stained  with  perspiration, 
—  garments  which  covered  rather  than  clothed  "the 
most  fertile  of  our  novelists."  But  maugre  the  dis- 
order and  poverty  of  the  costume,  no  one  would  have 
thought  of  mistaking  for  a  vulgar  stranger  the  stout 
man  with  blazing  eyes,  mobile  nostrils,  ruddy  cheeks, 
illumined  by  genius,  who  passed  by  carried  away  by  his 
dream  as  in  a  whirlwind.  At  sight  of  him  sarcasm 
stopped  on  the  street  boy's  lips  and  the  serious  man 

124 


************************ 

HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

ceased  to  smile  ;  one  guessed  that  he  was  a  king  of 
thought. 

Sometimes,  on  the  contrary,  he  would  be  seen  walk- 
ing slowly,  his  nose  in  the  air,  his  eyes  hunting  around, 
following  first  one  side  of  the  street,  then  examining 
the  other,  gaping,  not  at  the  birds,  but  at  the  signs. 
He  was  looking  for  names  to  give  to  his  characters. 
He  rightly  claimed  that  a  name  can  no  more  be  in- 
vented than  a  word.  According  to  him,  names  came 
of  themselves,  like  languages ;  real  names,  besides, 
possessed  a  life,  a  meaning,  a  variety,  a  cabalistic 
power,  and  it  was  impossible  to  consider  the  choice  of 
a  name  too  important.  Leon  Gozlan  has  told  charm- 
ingly in  his  "  Balzac  en  pantoufles,"  how  the  famous 
Z.  Marcas  of  the  "  Revue  parisienne  "  was  discovered. 
A  stove-man's  sign  furnished  the  long  sought  for  name 
of  Gubetta  to  Victor  Hugo,  who  was  no  less  care- 
ful than  Balzac  in  the  appellations  he  gave  to  his 
characters. 

The  hard  life  of  night  work  had,  in  spite  of  his 
strong  constitution,  left  its  mark  upon  Balzac's  face, 
and  I  find  in  "  Albert  Savarus  "  a  portrait  of  himself 
drawn  by  him,  which  represents  him  such  as  he  was  at 
that  time  (1842),  with  some  slight  modifications. 

125 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

"  A  splendid  head,  the  black  hair  already  streaked  with 
white,  hair  like  that  of  Saint  Peter  or  Saint  Paul  in  pictures, 
with  thick,  shining  curls,  hair  as  hard  as  horsehair ;  a  neck 
round  and  white  like  a  woman's  ;  a  splendid  brow,  divided  by 
that  deep  wrinkle  which  great  projects  create,  which  deep 
meditations  imprint  on  the  brow  of  great  men ;  an  olive  com- 
plexion flushed  with  red  spots ;  a  square  nose,  fiery  eyes, 
hollow  cheeks,  with  two  long  wrinkles  indicative  of  suffering  ; 
a  mouth  with  a  pleasant  smile,  and  a  small  chin  ;  two  small 
crow's-feet  on  the  temples ;  hollow  eyes  rolling  under  deep- 
set  eyebrows  like  two  globes  of  fire;  but  in  spite  of  these 
marks  of  violent  passions,  a  look  of  calmness  and  deep  resigna- 
tion ;  a  voice  of  penetrating  sweetness,  surprising  by  its 
facility,  —  the  real  orator's  voice,  sometimes  clean  and  crafty, 
sometimes  insinuating,  and  thunderous  at  need,  then  turning 
to  sarcasm  and  becoming  incisive.  Mr.  Albert  Savarus  is  of 
middle  stature,  neither  stout  nor  thin.  Finally,  his  hands  are 
like  the  hands  of  a  prelate." 

In  this  portrait,  which  is  very  faithful  on  the  whole, 
Balzac  has  somewhat  idealised  himself  for  the  sake  of 
the  novel,  and  diminished  his  weight  by  a  few  pounds, 
a  license  quite  permissible  to  a  hero  beloved  of  the 
Duchess  of  Argaiolo  and  Madame  Philomene  de 
Watteville.  "  Albert  Savarus,"  one  of  the  least  known 
and  least  frequently  quoted  novels  of  Balzac,  contains 
many  details,  somewhat  modified,  as  to  his  habits  of 

126 


4?  tfe  *  ^fc  db  tfc  3?  i  d?  wb  *?  *?!*?  tfc  tS?  S?  3?  S?  tfe  4?  tS?  ti?  tt?  4? 

HQNORE    DE    BALZAC 

life  and  work.  One  might  even  see  in  it,  were  it  per- 
missible to  lift  such  veils,  confidences  of  another  kind. 
Balzac  had  left  the  rue  des  Batailles  for  the  Jardies ; 
he  then  went  to  live  at  Passy.  The  house  which  he 
inhabited,  situated  upon  a  sharp  slope,  presented  a 
rather  curious  architectural  arrangement :  you  entered 
it  somewhat  as  wine  enters  into  a  bottle,  —  you  had  to 
go  down  three  stories  to  reach  the  ground  floor.  The 
entrance  door  on  the  street  side  opened  almost  in  the 
roof,  like  an  attic.  I  once  dined  there  with  Leon  Goz- 
lan.  It  was  a  strange  dinner  prepared  in  accordance 
with  the  economic  recipes  invented  by  Balzac.  At  my 
express  request  the  famous  onion  soup,  endowed  with 
so  many  hygienic  and  symbolical  virtues,  and  which 
nearly  killed  Lassailly,  did  not  form  part  of  it,  but  the 
wines  were  wonderful.  Every  bottle  had  its  history, 
and  Balzac  told  it  with  unequalled  eloquence,  spirit, 
and  conviction.  The  claret  had  thrice  gone  around  the 
world ;  the  Chateau-Neuf  du  Pape  went  back  to  fabu- 
lous days;  the  rum  was  drawn  from  a  cask  tossed  by 
the  ocean  for  more  than  a  century,  and  which  had  been 
opened  with  axes,  so  thick  was  the  crust  formed  upon 
it  by  shells,  madrepores,  and  seaweed.  Our  palates, 
surprised,  irritated  by  acid  flavours,  in  vain  protested 

127 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

against  these  illustrious  origins ;  Balzac  was  as  serious 
as  an  augur,  and  in  spite  of  the  proverb  we  looked  at 
him  in  vain,  we  could  not  make  him  laugh.  At  des- 
sert appeared  pears  so  ripe,  so  large,  so  mellow,  so 
juicy,  that  they  would  have  been  fit  for  a  king's  banquet. 
Balzac  devoured  five  or  six,  the  juice  running  down 
his  chin.  He  believed  that  this  fruit  was  healthful, 
and  he  ate  it  in  such  quantities  as  much  for  hygienic 
reasons  as  because  he  was  fond  of  it.  He  already  felt 
the  first  symptoms  of  the  disease  which  was  to  kill 
him.  Death,  with  its  lean  fingers,  was  feeling  that 
robust  body  to  know  where  to  attack  it,  and  finding  it 
weak  nowhere,  it  killed  him  by  plethora  and  hyper- 
trophy. Balzac's  cheeks  were  always  flushed  and 
marked  with  those  red  spots  which  are  to  careless  eyes 
an  indication  of  health  ;  but  to  the  observer  the  yellow 
hepatitic  tones  surrounded  with  their  golden  halo  the 
tired  eyelids.  The  glance,  made  brighter  by  that 
warm,  brown  tone,  appeared  but  more  brilliant  and 
more  sparkling,  and  lulled  anxiety. 

At  this  moment  Balzac  was  very  full  of  occult 
sciences,  of  chiromancy,  of  cartomancy.  He  had 
been  told  of  a  sibyl  more  amazing  even  than  Made- 
moiselle Lenormant,  and  he  induced  me,  as  well  as 

128 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

Madame  de  Girardin  and  Mery,  to  go  and  consult  her 
with  him.  The  pythoness  lived  at  Auteuil,  I  have 
forgotten  in  what  street ;  nor  does  it  matter,  for  the 
address  given  us  was  the  wrong  one.  We  came 
plump  upon  a  family  of  worthy  townspeople  enjoying 
the  country,  —  the  husband,  the  wife,  and  an  old 
mother,  whose  looks  Balzac,  who  was  certain  she 
must  be  the  fortune-teller,  maintained  were  absolutely 
cabalistic.  The  good  lady,  not  at  all  flattered  at  being 
taken  for  a  witch,  got  angry ;  the  husband  took  us 
for  practical  jokers  or  rascals ;  the  younger  woman 
laughed  loud  and  long,  and  the  maid  prudently  hast- 
ened to  lock  up  the  silver.  We  had  to  withdraw  in 
confusion,  but  Balzac  maintained  that  that  was  the 
house,  and  having  climbed  back  into  the  carriage, 
muttered  insults  addressed  to  the  old  woman  :  "  Stryge, 
harpy,  magician,  empresa,  larva,  lamia,  lemur,  ghoul, 
psylla,  aspiole,"  and  whatever  a  thorough  knowledge 
of  Rabelais'  litanies  could  suggest  in  the  way  of  curi- 
ous expressions.  We  tried  in  a  few  other  places,  still 
fruitlessly,  and  Delphine  maintained  that  Balzac  had 
imagined  this  "resource  of  Quinola"  in  order  to  be 
driven  to  Auteuil,  where  he  had  some  business,  and  to 
have  pleasant  companions  with  him. 

9  129 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

I  fancy,  however,  that  Balzac  found  for  himself  that 
Madame  Fontaine  whom  we  were  looking  for  together, 
for  in  the  "  Comediens  sans  le  savoir"  he  has  described 
her  between  her  hen  Bibouche  and  her  toad  Astaroth, 
with  frightful,  fantastic  truthfulness,  if  such  words 
can  be  combined.  Did  he  seriously  consult  her,  or 
did  he  go  to  see  her  simply  as  an  observer  ?  There 
are  certain  passages  in  the  tc  Comedie  humaine  "  which 
seem  to  imply  that  Balzac  did  have  a  sort  of  faith  in 
occult  sciences,  concerning  which  officially  recognised 
sciences  have  not  yet  spoken  their  last  word.  About 
this  time  Balzac  began  to  exhibit  a  fancy  for  old 
furniture,  boxes,  and  china.  The  smallest  bit  of 
worm-eaten  furniture  which  he  bought  in  the  rue  de 
Lappe  always  came  from  some  illustrious  place,  and 
he  developed  detailed  genealogies  concerning  the 
simplest  knick-knacks.  He  concealed  them  here  and 
there,  always  on  account  of  those  fantastic  creditors, 
in  whose  existence  I  began  to  disbelieve.  I  even 
amused  myself  by  spreading  the  report  that  Balzac 
was  a  millionaire,  and  that  he  was  purchasing  old 
stockings  from  dealers  in  insects  and  beetles  to  hide 
ounces,  quadruples,  Genovines,  cross-pieces,  pillar- 
pieces  and  double  louis,  after  the  manner  of  Father 

130 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

Grandet;  I  reported  everywhere  that  he  had  three 
wells,  like  Abul  Khasim,  filled  to  the  mouth  with 
carbuncles,  dinars,  and  omans.  u  Theo  will  be  the 
cause  of  my  having  my  throat  cut  some  morning 
with  his  nonsense,"  said  Balzac,  annoyed  and  delighted 
at  one  and  the  same  time. 

My  jokes  gained  some  appearance  of  likelihood 
from  the  new  dwelling  inhabited  by  Balzac,  in  the 
rue  Fortune,  in  the  Beaujon  quarter,  less  peopled 
then  than  now.  He  had  there  a  small,  mysterious 
house,  which  had  sheltered  the  loves  of  a  luxurious 
financier.  From  the  outside  one  caught  a  glimpse 
over  the  wall  of  a  sort  of  cupola,  formed  by  the 
arched  ceiling  of  a  boudoir,  and  of  the  fresh  paint  of 
the  closed  shutters. 

When  one  entered  this  nook,  which  was  not  easy, 
for  the  master  of  the  house  concealed  himself  with 
excessive  care,  a  thousand  details  of  excessive  luxury 
and  comfort  were  seen  which  contradicted  the  poverty 
that  he  affected.  He  received  me,  however,  one  day, 
and  I  saw  a  dining-room  wainscoted  with  old  oak, 
with  a  table,  chimneypiece,  sideboards,  credences,  and 
chairs  of  carved  wood  which  would  have  made  Ber- 
ruguete,  Cornejo,  Duque,  and  Verbruggen  envious ; 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

a  drawing-room  hung  with  golden  yellow  damask, 
with  doors,  cornices,  plinths,  and  windows  of  ebony ; 
a  library  of  books  placed  in  cases  inlaid  with  mother- 
of-pearl  and  copper  in  the  style  of  Boulle ;  a  bathroom 
in  yellow  breccia  with  stucco  bassi-relievi ;  a  domed 
boudoir,  the  old  paintings  of  which  had  been  restored 
by  Edmond  Hedouin ;  a  gallery  lighted  from  above, 
which  I  recognised  later  in  the  collection  of  "  Cousin 
Pons  ;  "  on  the  shelves  all  sorts  of  curiosities,  Dresden 
and  Sevres  porcelain,  vases  of  craquele  celadon ;  and 
on  the  stairs,  which  were  covered  with  a  carpet,  tall 
Chinese  vases  and  a  splendid  lantern  suspended  by  a 
red  silk  rope. 

"  You  must  have  emptied  one  of  Abul  Khasim's 
hiding-places,"  said  I  laughingly  to  Balzac,  as  I  beheld 
these  splendours.  "You  see,  I  was  right  when  I 
said  that  you  are  a  millionaire." 

"  I  am  poorer  than  ever,"  he  replied,  assuming  a 
humble  and  contrite  look.  "  None  of  that  belongs  to 
me.  I  furnished  the  house  for  a  friend  who  is  ex- 
pected, —  I  am  only  the  watchman  and  guardian  of 
the  house." 

I  am  quoting  his  words  literally.  He  made  the 
same  reply  to  several  persons,  who  were  as  much 

132 


HONORE    DE    BALZAC 

amazed  as  I.  The  riddle  was  soon  solved  by  the 
marriage  of  Balzac  to  the  woman  whom  he  had  loved 
for  so  long  a  time. 

There  is  a  Turkish  proverb  which  says,  "When 
the  house  is  finished  Death  enters."  That  is  why 
sultans  always  take  care  to  have  a  palace  in  course 
of  construction,  which  they  are  very  careful  not  to 
finish.  Life  appears  to  want  nothing  to  be  complete 
save  misfortune ;  there  is  nothing  to  be  so  dreaded  as 
a  wish  which  has  been  fulfilled. 

The  famous  debts  were  paid  at  last,  the  desired 
marriage  was  an  accomplished  fact,  the  nest  made  for 
happiness  was  lined  with  down  and  cotton ;  and  as  if 
they  had  foreseen  his  approaching  death,  those  who 
envied  Balzac  began  to  praise  him.  The  "Parents 
pauvres "  and  "  Cousin  Pons,"  in  which  the  author's 
genius  shone  in  all  its  brilliancy,  were  unanimously 
admired.  This  was  too  much  glory;  there  was 
nothing  left  for  him  but  to  die.  The  disease  made 
rapid  progress,  but  no  one  believed  in  a  fatal  ending,  so 
much  did  we  all  trust  in  Balzac's  athletic  constitution. 
I  believed  firmly  that  he  would  see  us  all  to  the  grave. 

I  was  going  to  take  a  trip  to  Italy,  and  before  leav- 
ing I  wished  to  say  good-bye  to  our  illustrious  friend. 

'33 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

He  had  driven  out  to  pass  some  exotic  curiosity  through 
the  customs.  I  went  away  reassured,  and  at  the  mo- 
ment when  I  was  getting  into  the  carriage  I  was 
handed  a  note  from  Madame  de  Balzac  which  kindly 
explained,  with  polite  regret,  why  I  had  not  found 
her  husband  at  home.  At  the  foot  of  the  note  Balzac 
had  written  these  words  :  — 

"I  can  neither  read  nor  write  any  more. 

"DE  BALZAC." 

I  have  preserved  as  a  relic  that  dread  line,  probably 
the  last  ever  written  by  the  author  of  the  "  Comedie 
humaine."  It  was — but  I  did  not  understand  it  at 
first  —  the  last  cry,  the  "  Eli,  lama  sabacthani "  of  the 
thinker  and  worker.  The  thought  that  Balzac  could 
die  did  not  even  occur  to  me. 

A  few  days  later  I  was  eating  an  ice  at  the  Cafe 
Florian  on  the  Piazza  San  Marco;  I  opened  the 
Journal  des  D'ebats,  one  of  the  few  French  papers 
which  are  allowed  in  Venice,  and  I  saw  in  it  the  an- 
nouncement of  Balzac's  death.  I  nearly  fell  from  my 
chair  on  the  stone  flags  of  the  Piazza,  thunderstruck 
at  the  news ;  and  my  grief  was  soon  mingled  with  an 
unchristian  impulse  of  indignation  and  revolt,  for  all 

134 


HONORE     DE     BALZAC 

souls  are  of  equal  value  before  God.  I  had  just  been 
visiting  the  lunatic  asylum  in  the  island  of  San  Servolo, 
and  I  had  seen  there  decrepit  idiots,  octogenarian 
wrecks,  human  larvae,  deprived  even  of  animal  in- 
stinct ;  and  I  asked  myself  why  that  mighty  brain  had 
gone  out  like  a  candle  on  which  one  blows,  when 
tenacious  life  lingered  in  these  shadowed  brains,  faintly 
traversed  from  time  to  time  by  deceitful  gleams. 

Eight  years  have  elapsed  since  that  fatal  day,  and 
every  day  Balzac  looms  larger.  When  he  mingled  with 
his  contemporaries  he  was  imperfectly  appreciated,  for 
he  was  seen  only  partially  and  under  aspects  at  times 
unfavourable ;  now  the  edifice  which  he  built  rises  the 
higher  as  one  draws  away  from  it,  like  a  cathedral  in  a 
city,  masked  by  the  neighbouring  houses,  but  which  on 
the  horizon  looms  up  vast  above  the  lower  roofs  and 
monuments.  The  monument  has  not  been  completed, 
but  such  as  it  is,  it  is  terrifying  in  its  enormity,  and 
generations  to  come  will  ask  themselves  with  surprise, 
Who  was  the  giant  that  single-handed  raised  these  for- 
midable blocks  and  built  so  high  that  tower  of  Babel  in 
which  a  whole  world  is  buzzing  ? 

Dead  though  he  is,  Balzac  still  has  defamers.  The 
commonplace  reproach  of  immorality,  the  last  insult 

135 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

of  powerless  and  jealous  mediocrity,  or  often  of  mere 
stupidity,  is  still  cast  on  his  memory.  Not  only  is  the 
author  of  the  u  Comedie  humaine "  not  immoral,  he 
is  an  austere  moralist.  A  Royalist  and  a  Catholic, 
he  stands  up  for  authority,  praises  religion,  preaches 
duty,  blames  passions,  and  believes  that  happiness  is 
to  be  obtained  only  through  marriage  and  within  the 
family  circle. 

"  Man,"  he  says,  u  is  neither  good  nor  wicked ;  he 
is  born  with  instincts  and  appetites ;  society,  far  from 
depraving  him,  as  Rousseau  maintained,  improves  him 
and  makes  him  better,  but  interest  develops  also  his 
evil  tendencies.  Christianity,  and  especially  Catholi- 
cism, being,  as  I  have  stated  in  the  'Medecin  de 
campagne,'  a  complete  system  for  the  repression  of 
the  depraved  tendencies  of  man,  is  the  most  powerful 
factor  in  social  order." 

And  with  an  ingenuity  becoming  to  a  great  man, 
foreseeing  the  reproach  of  immorality  which  wrong- 
headed  people  would  address  to  him,  he  numbers  the 
characters  irreproachably  virtuous  which  are  to  be 
met  in  the  "  Comedie  humaine "  :  Pierrette  Lorrain, 
Ursule  Mirouet,  Constance  Birotteau,  La  Fosseuse, 
Eugenie  Grandet,  Marguerite  Claes,  Pauline  de  Ville- 

136 


HONORE     DE     BALZAC 

noix,  Madame  Jules,  Madame  de  la  Chanterie,  five 
Chardon,  Mademoiselle  d'Esgrignon,  Madame  Fir- 
miani,  Agathe  Rouget,  Renee  de  Maucombe  j  without 
counting  among  the  men  Joseph  Le  Bas,  Genestas, 
Benassis,  the  cure  Bonnet,  Dr.  Minoret,  Pillerault, 
David  Sechard,  the  two  Birotteaus,  Chaperon  the 
cure,  Popinot  the  judge,  Bourgeat,  the  Sauviats,  the 
Tascherons,  etc. 

Rascally  figures  are  not  lacking,  it  is  true,  in  the 
"  Comedie  humaine,"  but  is  Paris  peopled  exclusively 
by  angels  ? 


Portraits    of  the    Day 


HENRY    MURGER 

BORN  IN  1822  —  DIED  IN  1861 


HENRY  MURGER  thought  chiefly  about 
youth,  —  indeed,  he  may  be  said  to  have 
thought  of  youth  alone.  Life  seemed  to 
have  stopped  with  him  with  his  twentieth  year;  he 
did  not  look  forward,  but  backward,  and  at  every  step 
he  took  he  turned  his  head  around.  The  present  had 
scarcely  any  existence  for  him  ;  he  lived  in  the  past 
alone.  He  sorrowed  because  he  no  longer  experienced 
the  sweet  surprise  caused  by  emotions  and  feelings 
which  is  experienced  but  once,  and  he  constantly 
returned  to  it  in  thought.  He  was  wholly  retrospec- 
tive, and  in  order  to  give  colour  to  his  poetry,  he  had 
to  pass  it  through  the  prism  of  remembrance.  Although 
he  was  thirty-eight  when  he  died,  his  talent  was  al- 
ways that  of  a  young  man  of  twenty-five.  Like 
certain  actors  who  continue,  in  spite  of  their  age,  to 
play  lovers'  roles,  he  could  play  the  parts  of  youth 
only.  On  his  tree  of  life  the  flower  never  turned 

138 


HENRY     MURGER 


into  fruit;  it  was  bound  to  remain  a  flower  forever, 
and  if  it  fell  from  its  stem,  it  was  to  perfume  with  its 
faded  imprint  the  pages  of  a  reliquary.  A  bunch  of 
faded  violets,  a  bit  of  faded  ribbon,  a  lock  of  hair  under 
glass,  a  stray  glove,  formed  the  poet's  library.  He 
read  in  his  heart  only,  and  reproduced  only  the  impres- 
sion he  had  felt,  and  that  a  long  time  afterwards,  when 
it  was  idealised  through  regret  and  melancholy.  The 
pearls  in  his  jewel  case  are  the  tears  of  bygone  days 
which  he  preserved.  Most  careful  is  he  of  those  dear 
treasures.  With  a  trembling  hand,  in  spite  of  his  sar- 
castic look,  he  removes  the  sacred  dust,  and  when  not 
observed,  turns  a  tearful  glance  towards  the  wall  on 
which  hangs  near  a  Clodion  the  profile  of  Mimi  or 
Musette. 

I  am  speaking  of  the  poet  alone.  As  a  journalist, 
as  a  writer,  as  a  wit,  he  had  other  ways.  Henry 
Murger  was  a  child  of  Bohemia;  he  had  dwelt  in  its 
seven  castles  so  long  sought  by  Charles  Nodier,  and 
it  is  not  in  so  strange  a  country,  where  paradoxes  are 
commonplaces,  that  many  illusions  can  be  preserved. 
The  verdicts  of  wiseacres  are  reversed  forthwith,  and 
picaresque  wisdom  is  condensed  into  maxims  by  the 
side  of  which  La  Rochefoucauld's  appear  childish. 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

No  one  there  is  duped  by  anything  or  anybody,  and 
the  Bohemian,  though  in  the  midst  of  civilised  life, 
attains  to  the  suspicious  sagacity  of  the  Mohican. 
His  defensive  weapons  are  the  arrows  of  wit,  and 
some  of  his  kind  do  not  scruple  to  poison  them. 
Murger,  as  I  have  said,  never  belonged  to  that  class, 
but  his  hand  was  steady,  his  eye  true,  and  his  flash- 
ing bolts  always  struck  their  mark.  Tender-hearted, 
he  was  sceptically  minded  j  on  returning  from  a  sen- 
timental turn  in  the  woods,  he  took  a  turn  behind  the 
scenes  at  the  theatre,  and  the  journalist  rallied  the  lover 
so  hard  that  no  one  would  have  been  tempted  to  make 
fun  of  him,  not  even  his  own  mistress. 

Murger  had  long  since  left  the  country  which  artists 
and  poets  traverse,  at  the  beginning  of  their  career,  at 
least,  when  fathers  refuse  allowances  and  budding  talent 
gives  promise  only  of  a  future  harvest ;  but  he  seemed 
to  dwell  in  it  still,  so  much  did  his  thoughts  delight  to 
go  back  to  that  time  of  erratic  liberty  and  of  joyous 
want,  in  which  hope  bites  so  gaily  with  its  beautiful 
teeth  the  hard  bread  of  misery ;  and  indeed,  it  is  the 
happiest  time,  and  I  can  understand  the  regrets  felt 
for  its  disappearance.  But  it  lasts  a  few  years  only,  and 
there  is  no  sadder  sight  than  a  gray-haired  Bohemian  or 

140 


HENRY    MURGER 


college  student.  The  Philistines,  of  yore  the  victims 
of  so  many  practical  jokes,  are  rightly  entitled  to  rally 
him. 

Murger  lived  at  Marlotte,  near  Fontainebleau,  and 
in  his  waking  dreams  he  often  lost  himself  in  the 
forest,  in  spite  of  the  guiding  lines  and  the  footpaths 
laid  out  by  the  man  who  has  been  surnamed  the  Syl- 
vaa  ;  but  inspiration  came  to  the  poet  just  when  he  lost 
his  way.  There,  in  the  heart  of  strong,  healthy  nature, 
far  from  the  feverish  bustle  of  the  city,  that  charming 
writer  worked  slowly  and  leisurely,  so  that  at  times 
his  love  of  perfection  seemed  to  be  idleness.  He  lived 
his  youth  over  again  within  himself,  and  reproduced  it 
in  tales  sad  but  smiling,  bright  yet  tender.  During  the 
whole  summer  long  he  vanished  from  all  eyes,  but  in 
winter  he  occasionally  went  into  society,  which  ever 
welcomed  him  gladly.  He  might  be  met  on  the 
boulevard,  in  magazine  offices,  and  in  his  prodigal 
conversation  he  scattered  in  fifteen  minutes  more 
clever  hits  than  were  needed  for  a  whole  play. 

His  book,  "  Winter  Nights,"  opens  with  a  son- 
net by  way  of  preface,  in  which  the  author  ban- 
teringly  wishes  all  sorts  of  prosperity  to  the  being 
who  may  be  benevolent  enough,  artless  enough,  old- 

Hi 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

fashioned  enough,  to  pay  a  crown,  in  these  days 
of  prose,  for  three  hundred  pages  of  verse.  This 
sonnet,  to  use  one  of  Murger's  own  expressions, 
is  the  shrill  fife  which  jeers  at  the  violoncello,  for 
naught  can  be  more  tender,  more  suave,  more  full  of 
love,  than  the  poems  to  which  this  buffoon  sonnet  is 
prefixed. 

Love,  as  understood  by  Murger,  is  of  a  particular 
sort.  It  is  vain  to  look  in  his  work  for  ardent 
prayers,  hyperbolical  compliments,  exaggerated  lamen- 
tations, any  more  than  for  high-flown  dithyrambics  and 
odes  of  triumphant  intoxication;  nor  must  one  look 
for  deep  despair,  for  unending  sobs,  and  cries  that  rend 
the  heavens.  Love  with  him  shows  itself  mostly  in 
the  form  of  remembrance.  If  love  has  been  fortunate, 
it  is  silent,  nor  will  it  speak  unless  it  has  suffered  from 
betrayal,  infidelity,  or  death.  When  pleasure  itself  was 
silent,  grief  now  utters  a  sigh.  Indeed,  what  Murger 
likes  in  love  is  suffering;  he  delights  to  feel  the  thorn 
rankling  in  the  wound,  and  would  not  have  it  drawn. 
Leaning  sadly  on  his  elbow,  he  watches  the  red  drops 
form  and  fall  one  by  one,  nor  will  he  stanch  the  flow, 
even  if  his  life  is  to  ebb  away  with  it.  He  did  not 
choose  his  mistress ;  chance  formed  their  ephemeral 

142 


HENRY    MURGER 


tie,  caprice  will  loosen  it  ;  the  swallow  came  in  by 
the  open  window;  some  fine  day  it  will  fly  away, 
obeying  its  migratory  instinct.  The  poet  knows  it, 
and  it  is  unnecessary  to  repeat  to  him  Shakespeare's 
words,  "  Frailty,  thy  name  is  woman."  He  has  fore- 
seen the  betrayal,  yet  he  suffers  from  it,  and  mourns 
over  it  with  such  gentle  bitterness,  with  such  tearful 
irony,  with  such  resigned  sadness,  that  the  reader 
shares  his  emotion.  Perhaps  he  did  not  love  the 
woman  he  regrets  when  she  was  faithful  to  him,  but 
now,  transfigured  as  she  is  by  absence,  he  worships 
her.  A  charming  figure  has  replaced  a  commonplace 
ideal,  and  Musette  becomes  the  equal  of  Beatrix  or 
Laura. 

Two  poems  —  "  The  Requiem  of  Love  "  and  "  Mu- 
sette's Song  "  —  in  that  part  of  the  book  entitled 
"  Lovers,"  strike  the  key-note  of  Murger's  poetry. 
In  the  first,  the  poet,  addressing  himself  to  the  mis- 
tress who  had  wrung  his  heart  with  feverish,  cruel 
delight,  like  the  Chinese  princess  who  almost  fainted 
as  she  tore  with  her  long,  transparent  nails  the  most 
precious  silken  stuffs,  seeks  an  air  to  which  he  may 
sing  the  requiem  of  his  dead  love.  He  tries  one 
after  another,  but  every  melody  recalls  a  remembrance. 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

"Oh,  not  that  motive!"  cries  the  poet;  "my  heart, 
which  I  believed  dead,  trembles  in  my  breast.  I  have 
heard  it  so  often  warbled  by  your  lips.  Nor  that 
waltz,  —  that  waltz  which  hurt  me  so  much !  Still 
less  that  lied  which  Germans  sang  in  the  Meudon 
woods  and  which  we  repeated  together !  No  music, 
—  but  let  us  talk  of  our  old  love  without  hatred  or 
anger."  And  Murger  recalls  the  winter  evenings 
spent  in  the  little  room,  by  the  fireside  on  which  the 
kettle  hums  its  regular  refrain ;  the  long  walks  in 
spring  through  the  meadows  and  the  woods,  and  the 
innocent  delights  enjoyed  in  the  midst  of  kindly 
nature ;  he  composes  once  more  that  eternal  poem 
of  youth  which  six  thousand  years  have  never  made 
old.  Then  comes  the  disappointment.  One  day  the 
poet  is  alone,  the  fair  one  is  gone.  Good-bye  to  the 
gray  shoes,  the  linen  dress  and  the  straw  hat  adorned 
with  a  natural  flower !  Rich  silks  rustle  around  the 
slender  form,  a  cashmere  shawl  hangs  in  folds  from 
the  shoulders  below  the  straying  blond  hair,  a  costly 
bracelet  sparkles  on  the  plump  arm,  rings  cover  the 
fingers,  formerly  browner,  but  now  white  through 
idleness.  He  might  have  expected  it,  the  story  is 
trite  and  common,  the  poet  himself  laughs  madly  at 

144 


HENRY    MURGER 


it.  ct  But  my  laughter  is  a  sarcasm  ;  my  pen,  as  I 
write,  trembles  in  my  hand,  and  when  I  smile,  my 
tears,  like  a  hot  shower,  wash  out  the  words  upon  the 
paper." 

The  second,  which  is  "  Musette's  Song,"  strikes  me 
as  a  perfect  masterpiece  of  grace,  tenderness,  and 
originality.  I  cannot  do  better  than  to  transcribe  it, 
it  is  the  best  way  to  praise  such  a  poem  :  — 

"  Yesterday,  as  I  saw  the  swallow  bringing  back  to  us  the 
time  of  spring,  I  remembered  the  fair  one  who  loved  me 
when  she  had  time,  and  during  the  long,  long  day  peaceful 
I  gazed  upon  the  old  almanac  of  the  year  gone  by,  when  she 
and  I  so  greatly  loved. 

"  No,  my  youth  is  not  yet  dead,  nor  is  the  thought  of  you 
vanished  now  ;  for  if  at  my  door  you  were  to  knock,  my 
heart,  Musette,  would  open  quick,  since  at  your  name  it 
always  starts.  O  thou  dear  Muse  of  faithlessness,  come  back 
again  to  eat  with  me  the  blessed  bread  of  happiness. 

"  The  furniture  of  our  little  room,  these  dear  old  friends  of 
our  dead  love,  already  smile  at  the  mere  hope  of  your  return. 
Come  back  ;  you  will  recognise,  my  dear,  all  those  who  your 
departure  mourned,  —  the  little  bed,  and  the  great  glass  in 
which  so  often  you  drank  my  share. 

"  Again  you  will  wear  that  fair  white  dress  with  which  of 
yore  you  were  adorned  ;  and  as  of  yore,  on  Sunday  next  into 
the  woods  we'll  wander  free..  Under  the  arbour  at  even 

10  145 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

seated,  again  we'll  drink  the  bright,  clear  wine  in  which  your 
song  its  wing  did  dip  before  in  air  it  flew  away. 

"  The  kindly  god  who  bears  no  grudge  for  the  naughty 
tricks  you  have  played  to  me,  will  not  refuse  to  grant  a  moon 
to  light  our  kissings  in  the  grove.  Lovely  nature  you  shall 
find  as  fair  to-day  as  then,  and  ever,  O  my  witching  dear, 
ready  upon  our  loves  to  smile. 

"  Musette,  to  whom  remembrance  came  when  carnival  time 
drew  to  an  end,  on  one  fine  morning  returned  to  me  like 
capricious  bird  to  its  old  nest.  But  as  I  kissed  the  faithless 
one,  my  heart  no  emotion  felt,  and  Musette  —  Musette  no- 
more  —  said  I  was  no  more  myself. 

"  Farewell,  begone,  my  dear,  dear  one  ;  for  now  in- 
deed, with  our  last  love,  our  youth  is  buried  deep  within  the 
old  almanac.  Only  by  stirring  up  the  ashes  of  the  fair  days  it 
once  did  hold  can  remembrance  ever  give  us  back  the  key  to- 
ope  our  lost  paradise." 

Two  poems  full  of  sad  presentiment  —  alas,  too 
true  !  —  close  the  book.  The  one  is  an  almost  caress- 
ing appeal  to  death ;  the  other  a  sort  of  testament,  half 
serious,  half  ironical,  in  which  the  author,  doubting 
whether  he  will  be  able  to  take  his  seat  among  the 
group  of  elect  who  will  see  "  PAfricaine,"  makes  his 
last  will  and  arranges  for  his  funeral,  and  draws  a  de- 
sign for  his  tomb.  Thomas  Hood,  the  witty  editor  of 
"  Punch  "and  the  author  of  that  "  Song  of  the  Shirt J> 

146 


HENRY    MURGER 


which  made  such  a  sensation  in  England,  also  indulged 
in  that  gloomy  fancy  of  drawing  his  own  monument, 
and  for  epitaph  he  put  on  it,  tc  He  wrote  the  '  Song  of 
the  Shirt  '."  So  might  be  written  on  Murger's  tomb, 
"  He  wrote  c  Musette's  Song  '." 


Portraits  of  the   D  ay 


CHARLES    BAUDELAIRE 

BORN  IN  1821  —  DIED  IN  1867 

SHORT  though  his  life  was,  —  he  was  scarce 
forty-six  when  he  died,  —  Charles  Baudelaire 
had  time  to  make  his  mark  and  to  inscribe  his 
name  upon  that  wall  of  the  nineteenth  century  on 
which  are  already  written  so  many  signatures,  many  of 
them  no  longer  legible  ;  but  his  will  remain,  I  have  no 
doubt,  for  it  is  that  of  a  man  whose  talent  was  original 
and  strong,  who  disdained  even  to  excess  the  common- 
places which  make  popularity  easy,  who  cared  only 
for  what  was  rare,  difficult,  and  strange,  whose  literary 
conscience  was  quick,  who  never,  in  spite  of  the  ne- 
cessities of  life,  let  go  a,  work  before  he  thought  it  per- 
fect, who  weighed  every  word  as  the  u  Misers  "  of 
Quentin  Matsys  weigh  doubtful  ducats,  who  read 
proofs  ten  times  over,  who  submitted  his  poems  to  the 
subtile  critic  that  was  himself,  and  who  sought  to  real- 
ise with  unwearying  efforts  the  particular  ideal  which 
he  had  set  up. 

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CHARLES    BAUDELAIRE 

Born  in  India  and  knowing  English  thoroughly,  he 
began  with  translations  of  Edgar  Poe,  which  are  so 
admirable  that  they  appear  to  be  original,  and  that  the 
author's  thoughts  are  improved  by  the  passage  from 
one  tongue  into  the  other.  Baudelaire  naturalised  in 
France  that  author  whose  imagination  is  so  learnedly 
eccentric,  and  by  the  side  of  whom  Hoffmann  is  but 
a  Paul  de  Kock  in  fantastic  literature.  Thanks  to 
Baudelaire,  I  enjoyed  the  uncommonly  rare  experience 
of  a  totally  unknown  literary  savour ;  my  mental  palate 
was  as  much  surprised  as  when  I  drank  at  the  Exposi- 
tion some  of  the  American  drinks,  sparkling  mixtures 
of  ice,  soda  water,  ginger,  and  other  exotic  ingredients. 
Into  what  mad  transports  of  delight  I  was  thrown  by 
the  reading  of  "  The  Gold  Bug,"  the  "  Fall  of  the 
House  of  Usher,"  and  all  those  tales  so  truly  called 
extraordinary.  The  fantastic  effects  produced  by  alge- 
braic and  scientific  processes,  tales  such  as  "  The  Mur- 
der in  the  Rue  Morgue,"  wrought  out  as  carefully  as  a 
judicial  inquiry,  and  especially  "The  Stolen  Letter," 
which  in  its  sagacious  inductions  could  give  points  to 
the  cleverest  detectives,  excited  curiosity  to  the  high- 
est degree,  and  Baudelaire's  name  became  in  some  sort 
inseparable  from  the  American  author's. 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

The  translations  were  preceded  by  a  most  interesting 
study  of  Edgar  Poe  from  the  biographical  and  meta- 
physical point  of  view.  It  was  impossible  to  analyse 
more  cleverly  a  genius  so  eccentric  that  at  times  it 
seems  to  border  on  madness,  and  which  has  for  its 
basis  a  pitiless  logic  that  carries  the  consequences  of 
an  idea  to  extremes.  The  mixture  of  heat  and  cold- 
ness, of  intoxication  and  mathematical  processes,  the 
strident  raillery  flushed  with  most  poetical  lyrical  effu- 
sions were  thoroughly  understood  by  Baudelaire.  He 
felt  the  liveliest  sympathy  for  the  proud  and  eccentric 
character  which  so  greatly  shocked  American  cant,  an 
unpleasant  variety  of  English  cant,  and  the  assiduous 
reading  of  that  dizzy  mind  had  a  great  influence  upon 
him.  Edgar  Poe  was  not  only  a  writer  of  extraordi- 
nary tales,  a  journalist  whom  no  one  has  surpassed  in 
the  art  of  arranging  a  scientific  canard,  a  supreme  prac- 
tical joker,  playing  upon  gaping  credulity ;  he  was  also 
an  aesthete  of  the  very  first  order,  a  very  great  poet, 
whose  art  was  most  refined  and  complex.  His  poem  of 
"  The  Raven  "  produces,  by  the  gradation  of  strophes 
and  the  disquieting  persistency  of  the  refrain,  an 
intense  effect  of  melancholy,  terror,  and  fatal  presenti- 
ment which  it  is  difficult  to  resist.  It  is  not  impugning 

150 


CHARLES    BAUDELAIRE 

Baudelaire's  originality  to  say  that  in  the  "  Flowers  of 
Evil"  there  is  a  reminiscence,  as  it  were,  of  Edgar 
Poe's  mysterious  manner,  with  a  background  of  Roman- 
ticist colouring. 

A  few  years  ago,  it  not  being  my  habit  to  wait  for 
the  death  of  my  friends  before  praising  them,  I  wrote 
an  essay  on  Baudelaire,  prefixed  to  a  selection  of  his 
poems  included  in  the  "  Collection  of  French  Poets," 
in  which  occurs  a  passage  on  the  "  Flowers  of  Evil," 
the  most  important  and  the  most  individual  work  of  the 
author.  As  this  passage  cannot  be  suspected  of  post- 
humous complaisance,  I  may  repeat  about  the  poet, 
who  has  died  so  prematurely  and  unfortunately,  what  I 
said  about  him  when  alive  :  — 

"  In  one  of  Hawthorne's  tales,  there  is  a  description  of  a 
curious  garden  in  which  a  botanist,  who  is  also  a  toxicologist, 
has  collected  the  flora  of  poisonous  plants.  These  plants,  with 
their  strangely  cut  leaves  of  a  blackish,  or  glaucous  mineral- 
green,  as  if  they  were  dyed  with  sulphate  of  copper,  possess 
a  sinister  and  formidable  beauty  ;  in  spite  of  their  charm, 
they  are  felt  to  be  dangerous  ;  their  haughty,  provoking,  and 
perfidious  attitude  betrays  the  consciousness  of  mighty  power 
or  irresistible  seductiveness.  Their  blooms,  fiercely  striped 
and  barred,  of  a  purple  colour  resembling  clotted  blood, 
or  chlorotic  white,  exhale  bitter,  intoxicating  perfumes ;  in 


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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

their  poisonous  calyxes  dew  is  transformed  into  aqua  tofana, 
and  around  them  buzz  only  cantharides  with  their  corselets 
of  green  and  gold,  and  steel-blue  flies  whose  sting  causes 
carbuncles.  The  euphorbia,  the  deadly  nightshade,  the 
henbane,  the  hemlock,  the  belladonna  mingle  their  cold  venom 
with  the  burning  poisons  of  the  tropics  and  of  India.  The 
manchineel  displays  its  little  apples,  as  deadly  as  those  that 
hung  from  the  tree  of  the  knowledge  of  good  and  evil,  the 
upas  tree  drops  its  milky  juice  which  burns  deeper  than  acid. 
Above  the  garden,  hovers  a  deadly  vapour  which  suffocates 
birds  as  they  pass  through  it.  Yet  the  doctor*  s  daughter  lives 
with  impunity  amid  these  mephitic  miasmas ;  her  lungs  breathe 
in  without  danger  an  atmosphere  which  to  any  one  else  than 
her  father  and  herself  would  be  certain  death.  She  makes 
necklaces  of  these  flowers,  she  adorns  her  hair  and  perfumes 
her  bosom  with  them,  she  bites  their  petals  as  maids  nibble  at 
the  petals  of  roses.  Slowly  saturated  with  venomous  juices, 
she  has  become  herself  a  living  poison  ;  she  neutralises  all 
others.  Her  beauty,  like  that  of  the  plants  of  the  garden,  has 
something  weird,  fatal,  morbid  about  it.  Her  hair,  of  a  bluish 
black,  contrasts  strangely  with  her  complexion,  dead  pale  and 
greenish,  on  which  her  lips  show  so  purple  that  they  seem  to 
be  stained  by  some  sanguine  berry  ;  her  strange  smile  reveals 
teeth  set  in  dark-red  gums,  and  her  fixed  glance  fascinates  and 
repels.  She  looks  like  one  of  those  Javanese  women,  vampires 
of  love,  diurnal  succubae,  whose  love  exhausts  in  a  fortnight 
the  blood,  the  marrow,  and  the  soul  of  a  European.  And 
yet  she  is  a  virgin,  she  is  the  doctor's  daughter,  and  languishes 

152 


CHARLES    BAUDELAIRE 

in  solitude.      Love  seeks  in  vain  to  acclimatise  itself  in  that 
atmosphere,  out  of  which  she  herself  could  not  live. 

"  I  have  never  read  the  '  Flowers  of  Evil '  of  Charles 
Baudelaire  without  thinking  involuntarily  of  this  tale  of  Haw- 
thorne's. His  flowers  also  have  sombre,  metallic  tints,  verdi- 
grised  fronds,  and  intoxicating  odours.  His  muse  resembles  the 
doctor's  daughter,  whom  no  poisons  can  harm  and  whose 
complexion,  by  its  bloodless  pallor,  tells  of  the  atmosphere  in 
which  she  lives." 

Baudelaire  was  pleased  with  this  comparison,  and  he 
liked  to  see  in  it  the  personification  of  his  talent.  He 
also  gloried  in  this  remark  of  a  great  poet :  "  You  have 
given  to  the  heaven  of  art  a  strange,  ghastly  beam ; 
you  have  created  a  new  shudder."  And  yet  it  would 
be  a  great  mistake  to  suppose  that  among  his  mandra- 
goras  and  poppies  and  colchicums  there  is  not  to  be 
met  with  here  and  there  a  blooming  rose  with  innocu- 
ous perfume,  some  great  Indian  flower  opening  its 
white  petals  to  the  pure  air  of  heaven.  When  Baude- 
laire depicts  the  ugly  things  of  humanity  and  civilisa- 
tion, it  is  with  secret  horror;  he  has  no  liking  for 
them ;  he  looks  upon  them  as  violations  of  the  uni- 
versal rhythm.  When  he  was  called  immoral,  —  a 
big  word  which  people  in  France  know  how  to  use 
nearly  as  well  as  people  in  America,  —  he  was  as 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE     DAY 

much  surprised  as  if  he  had  heard  jessamine  praised 
for  its  honesty,  and  bitter  ranunculus  stigmatised  for 
its  wickedness. 

Besides  Poe's  tales,  Baudelaire  translated  the  same 
author's  "Adventures  of  Allen  Gordon  Pym,"  which 
end  with  that  fearful  swallowing  up  in  the  whirlpool 
of  the  Antarctic  Pole.  He  also  put  into  French  the 
cosmogonic  dream  called  "  Eureka,"  in  which  the 
American  author,  making  use  of  the  celestial  mechan- 
ics of  La  Place,  seeks  to  guess  at  the  secret  of  the  uni- 
verse, and  believes  he  has  found  it.  How  difficult  was 
the  translation  of  such  a  piece  of  work  can  be  readily 
imagined. 

Under  the  title  of  "  The  Artificial  Paradise,"  Baude- 
laire summed  up,  at  the  same  time  introducing  into  it 
his  own  reflections,  the  work  of  De  Quincey,  the  Eng- 
lish opium-eater,  and  made  of  it  a  sort  of  treatise 
which  must  necessarily  in  several  places  be  almost 
identical  with  Balzac's  "  Theory  of  Stimulants,"  which 
has  remained  unpublished.  It  forms  most  interesting 
reading,  illumined  as  it  is  by  phantasmagoria  and  the 
depicting  of  the  most  brilliant,  the  most  curious,  the 
most  terrible  hallucinations  produced  by  this  seductive 
poison,  which  stupefies  China  and  the  East  with  its  fic- 

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CHARLES    BAUDELAIRE 

titious  bliss.  The  author  blames  the  man  who  seeks 
to  avoid  inevitable  pain  and  rises  into  an  artificial  para- 
dise only  to  fall  into  a  blacker  hell. 

Baudelaire  was  a  most  sagacious  art  critic,  and  he 
brought  to  the  appreciation  of  painting  a  metaphysical 
subtlety  and  an  originality  in  his  point  of  view  which 
make  one  regret  that  he  did  not  devote  more  time  to 
this  sort  of  work.  The  pages  which  he  wrote  about 
Delacroix  are  most  remarkable. 

Towards  the  end  of  his  life  he  wrote  a  few  short 
poems  in  prose,  but  in  rhythmic  prose,  wrought  out 
and  polished  like  the  most  concentrated  poetry.  They 
are  strange  fancies,  landscapes  of  another  world,  un- 
known figures  which  you  fancy  you  have  seen  else- 
where, spectral  realities,  phantoms  possessed  of  terrible 
reality.  These  productions  appeared  somewhat  at 
haphazard  here  and  there,  in  various  reviews,  and  it  is 
much  to  be  desired  that  they  should  be  collected  in 
book  form,  with  the  addition  of  any  others  which  the 
author  may  have  kept  in  his  desk. 


155 


Portraits   of  the   D  ay 


ALPHONSE    DE    LAMARTINE 

BORN  IN  1790  —  DIED  IN   1869 

I  DO  not  intend  to  write  a  biography  of  Lamar- 
tine,  still  less  a  detailed  estimate  of  his  work, 
but  I  do  wish  to  bring  that  great  figure  out  of 
the  half  shadow  in  which  he  enveloped  himself  for 
some  years  past  in  the  solitude  and  silence  of  his  later 
days,  and  to  place  it  in  the  light  which  henceforth  will 
never  again  desert  it. 

As  a  humble  poet,  enslaved  to  prose  through  the 
necessities  of  journalism,  I  shall  try  to  pass  judgment 
on  a  great  poet.  It  is  rash  of  me  to  do  so,  for  my 
brow  does  not  reach  his  feet,  but  statues  are  best  ap- 
preciated from  below.  His  deserves  to  be  carved  out 
of  the  finest  Parian  or  Carrara  marble,  free  from  all 
spot  or  stain. 

Lamartine  has  told  himself,  in  a  style  which  no  one 
else  can  imitate,  his  earliest  recollections  of  his  child- 
hood and  his  family  ;  he  has  told  of  the  opening  of  his 
young  soul  to  life,  to  reverie,  to  thought,  —  immortal 

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ALPHONSE    DE    LAMARTINE 

confidences  of  genius  which  the  public  collects  and  in 
which  it  takes  pleasure,  for  each  can  fancy  that  that 
voice,  so  intimate  and  penetrating,  speaks  to  him  alone 
as  to  an  unknown  friend.  So  I  shall  let  Lamartine 
seek,  through  his  reveries,  his  passions,  his  loves,  his 
travels,  in  the  course  of  a  life  apparently  idle,  the  way 
which  was  to  be  followed,  and  which  is  not  always 
easily  made  out  amid  the  tangled  minglings  of  human 
affections.  No  doubt  all  the  generous  sentiments 
which  he  was  to  express  so  admirably,  —  love,  faith, 
the  religious  worship  of  nature,  the  longing  for  heaven, 
—  were  already  surging  within  him ;  but  the  world  as 
yet  saw  in  him  only  a  handsome  youth,  aristocratic, 
elegant,  of  perfect  manners  and  destined  to  win  success 
in  drawing-rooms.  He  had  twice  travelled  in  Italy. 
At  that  time  he  said  nothing  of  the  impression  which 
must  have  been  produced  upon  him  by  the  clear 
heavens,  the  sea  bluer  even  than  the  sky,  the  vast 
prospects,  the  trees  with  shining,  strong  foliage,  the 
ruins  magnificent  in  their  destruction,  the  vigorous, 
warm-coloured  nature  through  which  wandered  like 
mute  shadows  inhabitants  bowed  under  the  yoke  of 
servitude  and  under  the  greatness  of  their  past.  But 
the  poetry  of  it  all  was  slowly  welling  up  within  his 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

heart,  the  secret  treasure  was  growing  every  day,  and 
new  pearls  were  being  added  to  the  mysterious  casket 
which  was  to  open  later.  If  he  rivalled  Byron,  to 
whom  he  dedicated  an  epistle  equal  to  the  finest  pas- 
sages of  "  Childe  Harold,"  it  was  merely  as  a  dandy. 

Having  returned  to  France,  he  allowed  some  years 
to  pass  by  in  that  feverish  yet  fruitful  idleness  whence 
spring  great  works;  and  in  1820  appeared  a  modest 
volume  for  which  he  had  some  difficulty  in  finding  a 
publisher.  It  was  the  "  Meditations."  This  book 
was  an  event  infrequent  in  the  course  of  ages.  It 
contained  a  whole  new  world,  a  world  of  poetry,  more 
difficult  perhaps  to  discover  than  America  or  the  At- 
lantides.  While  he  seemed  to  be  coming  and  going 
with  indifference  among  other  men,  Lamartine  was 
travelling  over  unknown  seas,  his  eye  fixed  upon  his 
star,  drawn  towards  a  shore  on  which  no  one  had  yet 
stepped,  and  had  returned  victorious  like  Columbus,  — 
he  had  discovered  the  soul. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  understand  to-day,  after  so 
many  revolutions,  downfalls,  and  vicissitudes  in  human 
affairs,  after  seeing  so  many  literary  systems  tried  and 
forgotten,  so  much  extravagance  in  thought  and  in  lan- 
guage, the  universal  enthusiasm  evoked  by  the  "  Medi- 

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ALPHONSE    DE    LAMARTINE 

tations."  It  was  like  a  breath  of  freshness  and  of 
rejuvenation,  like  the  fluttering  of  wings  passing  over 
souls.  Young  men  and  maidens  and  women  carried 
their  admiration  to  the  point  of  worship  ;  Lamartine's 
name  was  on  every  lip,  and  the  Parisians,  who  are  not 
poetic,  after  all,  filled  with  madness  like  the  Abderites 
who  incessantly  repeated  the  chorus  of  Euripides,  "  O 
Love,  mighty  Love,"  quoted,  as  they  met,  the  stanzas 
of  "  The  Lake."  Never  was  there  so  great  a  success. 

The  fact  is,  Lamartine  was  not  merely  a  poet,  he 
was  poetry  itself.  His  chaste,  elegant,  noble  language 
seemed  to  ignore  wholly  the  ugly  and  mean  side  of 
life.  As  the  book  was,  so  was  the  author,  and  the 
best  frontispiece  which  could  have  been  selected  for 
the  volume  of  verse  was  the  poet's  own  portrait;  a 
lyre  in  his  hands  and  on  his  shoulders  a  cloak  blown 
about  by  the  storm  were  in  no  wise  ridiculous. 

What  deep,  new  accents,  what  ethereal  aspirations, 
what  upspringing  towards  the  ideal,  what  effusions  of 
love,  what  tender  and  melancholy  notes,  what  sighs 
and  questionings  of  the  soul  which  no  poet  had  yet 
caused  to  sound !  In  the  pictures  drawn  by  Lamartine, 
the  heavens  always  occupy  much  space.  He  needs 
that  space  to  move  about  easily,  and  to  draw  broad 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

circles  around  his  thoughts.  He  floats,  he  flies,  he 
soars ;  like  the  swan  resting  on  its  great,  white  wings, 
sometimes  in  the  light,  sometimes  in  a  light  haze, 
sometimes,  too,  in  storm  clouds,  he  rarely  settles  on 
the  earth,  and  soon  resumes  his  flight  with  the  first 
breeze  that  ruffles  his  plumes.  That  fluid,  transpar- 
ent, aerial  element  which  opens  before  him  and  closes 
behind  him,  is  his  natural  road  ;  he  maintains  himself 
in  it  without  difficulty  for  many  hours,  and  from  his 
lofty  heights  he  sees  the  landscape  turn  faint  and  blue, 
the  waters  shimmer  and  the  buildings  rise  in  vaporous 
effacement. 

Lamartine  is  not  one  of  those  marvellous  artist  poets 
who  hammer  verse  as  if  it  were  a  blade  of  gold  upon 
a  steel  anvil,  making  closer  the  grain  of  the  metal  and 
shaping  it  to  sharp,  accurate  outlines.  He  ignores  or 
disdains  every  excess  of  form,  and  with  the  negligence 
of  the  nobleman,  who  rimes  only  when  minded,  without 
restricting  himself  to  technical  matters,  he  writes  admi- 
rable poems  as  he  rides  through  the  woods,  as  he  floats 
in  his  boat  along  some  shady  bank,  or  leans  on  the 
window  of  one  of  his  castles.  His  verse  rolls  on  with 
harmonious  murmur,  like  the  waves  of  Italian  or  Greek 
waters,  which  bear  on  their  transparent  crests  branches 

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ALPHONSE    DE    LAMARTINE 

of  laurel,  golden  fruits  fallen  from  the  shore,  and  reflect 
the  sky,  the  birds  or  the  sails,  or  break  on  the  strand  in 
brilliant,  silvery  foam.  Its  full,  sweeping,  successive 
undulating  forms,  impossible  to  fix  as  water,  reach 
their  aim,  and,  fluid  as  they  are,  bear  thoughts  as  the 
sea  bears  vessels,  whether  a  frail  skiff  or  a  ship  of 
the  line. 

There  is  a  magic  charm  in  that  breathing  verse, 
which  swells  and  sinks  like  the  breast  of  ocean  ;  one  is 
carried  away  by  the  melody,  by  the  chorus  of  rimes,  as 
by  the  distant  song  of  sailors  or  sirens.  Lamartine  is 
probably  the  greatest  magician  in  poetry. 

His  broad,  vague  manner  of  writing  suits  the  exalted 
spirituality  of  his  nature.  The  soul  does  not  need  to 
be  carved  like  Greek  marble.  Lights  and  sounds, 
breathings,  opaline  tints,  rainbow  colours,  blue  moon- 
light-beams, diaphanous  gauze,  aerial  draperies  swelling 
and  rising  in  the  breeze,  suffice  to  depict  and  envelop 
it.  The  Latin  expression,  musce  ales,  seems  to  have 
been  invented  for  Lamartine. 

In  that  immortal  poem,  "The  Lake,"  in  which 
passion  speaks  a  tongue  which  the  finest  music  has 
never  equalled,  vaporous  nature  appears  as  through  a 
silver  gauze,  distant,  afar,  painted  with  a  few  touches 

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******  *  £  ********  ******** 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

so  it  shall  serve  as  a  framework  and  a  background 
to  that  unforgettable  remembrance ;  and  yet  everything 
is  seen,  the  light  in  the  heavens,  the  water  and  the 
rocks,  the  trees  on  the  shore  and  the  mountains  on  the 
horizon,  and  every  wave  that  casts  its  foam  upon  the 
adored  feet  of  Elvira. 

And  yet,  because  in  Lamartine  there  is  always  a 
mist  and  a  sound  of  the  aeolian  harp,  it  is  not  to  be 
taken  for  granted  that  he  is  merely  a  melodious  lake 
poet,  and  can  only  sigh  softly  of  melancholy  and  love. 
If  he  sighs,  he  can  also  speak  and  shout ;  he  rules  as 
easily  as  he  charms  ;  his  angelic  voice,  which  seems  to 
issue  from  the  depths  of  the  heavens,  can  assume  at 
need  a  virile  accent. 

At  Naples,  a  marriage  brought  about  by  that  admi- 
ration which  attracts  women  to  the  poet  of  their  dreams, 
made  him  happy  and  rich.  A  young  lady,  like  those 
charming,  romantic  heroines  of  Shakespeare,  who  are 
attracted  by  a  glance,  and  who  are  faithful  unto  death, 
brought  him  her  love  and  a  most  princely  fortune. 
France  saw  the  phenomenon,  rare  in  our  country,  of  a 
poet  who  was  not  poor,  and  whose  fancy  could  unfold 
itself  splendidly  in  the  full  sunshine.  People  affect  to 
believe  that  poverty,  that  lean,  harsh  nurse,  is  better  for 

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ALPHONSE    DE    LAMARTINE 

genius  than  riches.  It  is  a  mistake.  A  poet's  nature 
is  prodigal,  careless,  generous;  it  loves  luxury  as  the 
material  expression  of  poesy  ;  it  loves  to  realise  its 
caprices  in  its  verse  and  in  its  life,  to  form  for  itself  an 
environment  from  which  shall  be  excluded  every  ugly, 
mean,  prosaic  thing.  Mathematics  are  repugnant  to  it 
(Lamartine  had  a  horror  of  them  and  looked  upon 
them  as  obstacles  to  thought),  and  with  a  hand  that 
never  counts  it  draws  from  the  three  wells  of  Abul 
Khasim  the  dinars  which  it  scatters  around  like  a  golden 
rain.  Untroubled  by  any  of  those  obstacles  which 
wear  out  the  strength  of  the  greatest  minds,  Lamartine 
was  enabled  to  give  free  course  to  his  genius,  to  expand 
completely,  and  the  chill  of  poverty  did  not  wither  its 
magnificent  flowers. 

After  the  u  Meditations  "  came  the  "  Harmonies," 
in  which  the  poet's  flight  reaches  to  the  greatest 
heights,  —  it  seems  to  take  him  within  the  starry 
regions.  There  are  in  this  volume  poems  of  ineffable 
beauty  and  of  grand  melancholy.  Never  since  the  days 
of  Job  did  the  human  soul  utter,  in  the  presence  of  the 
formidable  mysteries  of  life  and  death,  more  desperate, 
heart-breaking  plaints  than  in  the  u  Novissima  Verba." 

The  success  of  the  "  Harmonies  "  was  immense,  but 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

though  the  work  was  superior  to  its  predecessor,  its 
success  could  not  surpass  that  of  the  u  Meditations." 
Admiration  had  at  once  bestowed  on  Lamartine  all 
that  it  can  give  to  a  man;  it  had  exhausted  in  his 
favour  its  flowers  and  its  censers ;  no  additional  beam 
could  be  put  into  the  aureole  of  the  poet,  the  splen- 
dour of  his  noonday  could  add  nothing  to  the  glory 
of  his  dawn. 

Amid  these  sounds  of  triumph,  Lamartine  had  started 
on  his  voyage  to  the  Orient,  not  as  a  humble  pilgrim 
with  white  staff  in  his  hand,  and  scallops  on  shoulder, 
but  with  royal  luxury,  on  a  vessel  chartered  by  himself, 
which  bore  for  the  emirs  presents  worthy  of  Haroun  al 
Raschid  ;  and  once  he  landed,  travelling  with  caravans 
of  Arab  horses  that  he  had  purchased,  buying  the  houses 
in  which  he  had  slept,  erecting  in  the  desert  tents  as 
splendid  as  Solomon's  pavilions  of  gold  and  purple. 
Lord  Byron  alone  had  made  poetry  travel  so  sumptu- 
ously. The  tribes,  amazed,  hastened  with  acclamations 
along  his  way,  and  nothing  would  have  been  easier  for 
the  poet  than  to  have  had  himself  proclaimed  Caliph. 
Lady  Hester  Stanhope,  that  illuminated  Englishwoman 
who  inhabited  Lebanon,  offered  him  the  horse  whose 
back  in  its  outline  resembles  a  sort  of  saddle  and  which 

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ALPHONSE    DE    LAMARTINE 

Hakim,  the  king  of  the  Druses,  is  to  ride  in  his  next 
incarnation.  She  predicted  to  him  that  one  day  he 
would  hold  in  his  aristocratic  hand  the  destinies  of 
his  country. 

Through  all  this  Lamartine  passed  on,  tranquil, 
almost  indifferent,  like  a  high-bred  lord  whom  nothing 
astonishes  and  who  feels  that  all  the  homage  paid  him 
is  his  due.  He  accepted  all  the  worship  with  a  kindly 
smile,  but  without  being  intoxicated  by  it.  It  appeared 
quite  natural  to  him  that  he  should  be  handsome,  ele- 
gant, rich,  endowed  with  genius,  and  that  he  should 
excite  admiration  and  love.  But  that  almost  super- 
human happiness  was  not  to  last.  The  ancient 
Greeks  believed  in  the  existence  of  jealous  divinities 
which  they  called  Moirae,  the  jealous  eyes  of  which 
were  hurt  by  the  sight  of  the  happiness  which  they 
enjoyed  spoiling.  It  was  to  appease  the  Moirae 
that  Polycrates,  too  happy,  cast  into  the  sea  his  ring, 
which  a  fisherman  brought  back.  No  doubt  one  of 
these  wicked  deities  met  the  poet  on  his  triumphal  tour 
and  was  shocked  by  his  happiness  and  glory,  by  the 
union  in  him  of  so  marvellous  gifts.  She  stretched  out 
her  withered  hand,  and  Julia,  the  lovely  child,  who 
was  accompanying  her  father  to  those  sunny  lands  in 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

which  life  seems  to  renew  its  energies,  bowed  her  head 
like  a  flower  touched  by  the  ploughshare,  and  the 
vessel  which  had  sailed  with  white  wings,  came  back 
with  black  sails,  bringing  a  bier. 

The  loss  was  irreparable,  the  despair  was  lasting,  the 
wound  one  of  those  which  can  never  close  and  which 
ever  bleed.  No  doubt  it  was  reserved  to  the  two 
greatest  poets  of  our  day  to  feel  that  grief  which 
cannot  be  consoled  in  order  that  they  should  pay  for 
their  glory. 

The  muse  alone  with  its  rhythms  can  soothe  and 
sometimes  lull  that  regret  for  the  dear  being  lost  for  no 
apparent  reason.  Lamartine  published  his  "  Jocelyn," 
a  tender  and  pure  epic  of  the  soul,  in  which  are  re- 
lated, not  the  brilliant  adventures  of  a  hero,  but  the 
sufferings  of  a  lowly,  unknown  heart ;  a  delicate  master- 
piece full  of  feeling  and  of  tears  of  Alpine  whiteness, 
as  pure  as  the  snow  of  the  highest  peaks  which  no 
impure  breath  reaches,  and  where  love,  which  is  un- 
aware of  its  own  existence,  so  chaste  is  it,  might  form 
the  subject  of  contemplation  for  angels.  Never  was 
a  success  more  sympathetic,  never  was  a  book  more 
eagerly  read  and  more  wetted  with  tears. 

The  "  Angel's   Fall "   was  not  so  well  understood. 

166 


ALPHQNSE    DE    LAMARTINE 

Magnificent  passages  rich  in  Oriental  colour,  which 
seemed  to  be  leaves  taken  from  the  Bible,  were  but 
half  successful,  and  that  because  of  the  strangeness 
of  the  subject,  the  singularity  of  the  pictures  drawn 
from  a  world  anterior  to  our  own,  the  excessive 
grandeur  of  personages  greater  than  human  nature; 
and  further,  I  must  confess,  through  increasing  care- 
lessness in  composition  and  style. 

After  the  publication  of  the  "  Poetic  Recollections  " 
with  their  long  vibrations,  last  echoes  of  the  "  Medi- 
tations "  and  of  the  "  Harmonies,"  the  poet  bade  fare- 
well to  the  muse  and  laid  down  his  harp,  never  again 
to  take  it  up.  He  was  filled  with  the  desire  for  a 
practical  and  active  life.  He  had  been  attache  and 
life-guard,  he  now  wished  to  be  a  deputy.  People 
who  think  they  are  serious-minded  because  they  are 
prosaic,  unaware  that  poetry  alone  influences  the  soul 
and  that  imagination  carries  away  the  crowd,  sneered 
as  they  saw  the  dreamer  who  was  called  "  Elvira's 
poet,"  approach  the  tribune ;  but  soon  it  was  under- 
stood that  he  who  can  sing  can  also  speak,  and  that 
the  poet  has  a  golden  mouth.  From  his  harmonious 
lips  speeches  came  winged,  vibrating,  and  possessing 
like  the  bee  at  once  honey  and  a  sting.  Poetry  is 

167 


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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

easily  transformed  into  eloquence ;  it  has  passion, 
warmth,  thought,  generous  feeling,  prophetic  instinct, 
and  —  no  matter  what  one  may  say  to  the  contrary  — 
that  high,  supreme  reason  which  soars  over  everything 
and  does  not  allow  general  truth  to  be  troubled  by 
accidental  facts. 

The  Girondins  brought  about  the  Revolution,  or  at 
least,  greatly  helped  it.  Lamartine  found  himself  in 
the  presence  of  the  billows  which  he  had  let  loose,  and 
which  broke  in  foam  and  thunder  at  his  feet,  rolling  on 
their  angry  crests  the  debris  of  the  last  monarchy ;  he 
accepted  the  mission  to  harangue  the  stormy  sea,  to 
reason  with  the  tempest,  to  hold  back  the  lightning 
within  the  clouds.  It  was  a  dangerous  mission,  which 
he  accomplished  like  a  nobleman  and  a  hero.  Then 
it  was  plainly  seen  that  all  poets  were  not  like  Horace, 
who  fled  from  the  battlefield,  non  bene  relicta  parmula. 
He  had  cast  a  spell  upon  ferocious  instincts,  and  the 
tamed  tumult  roared  under  his  balcony  to  make  him 
come  forth,  to  see  him  and  hear  him.  As  soon  as  he 
appeared,  the  crowd  was  silent,  awaiting  some  noble 
words,  some  grave  advice,  some  generous  thought,  and 
it  withdrew  satisfied,  bearing  away  with  it  the  seeds  of 
harmony  and  of  devotion  to  humanity. 

168 


ALPHONSE    DE    LAMARTINE 

The  poet  exposed  himself  to  the  bullet  which  might 
be  shot  by  some  too  radical  utopist  or  too  backward  a 
fanatic,  with  the  high-bred  disdain  of  the  nobleman 
who  despises  death  as  being  vulgar  and  common,  —  a 
superior  sort  of  dandyism  which  middle-class  people 
find  it  difficult  to  imitate.  If  he  threw  himself  of  his 
own  free  will  into  that  abyss,  it  was  because  he  had  no 
interest  whatever  in  it,  and  was  sure  to  destroy  himself. 
Then  was  seen  a  thing  strange  indeed  in  our  modern 
civilisation,  —  a  man  playing  in  open  day  and  in  his 
own  person  the  part  of  a  moderating  Tyrtaeus,  of  an 
Orpheus,  tamer  of  wild  beasts,  doctus  lenire  tigres,  urg- 
ing to  well  doing,  calling  away  from  evil,  and  stretch- 
ing over  disorder  the  thought  of  harmony  and  of 
beauty.  Without  a  police,  without  an  army,  without 
any  repressive  means,  he  held  in  by  pure  poetry  a 
whole  excited  people.  He  uttered  in  the  presence  of 
the  extreme  republicans  these  sublime  words :  "  The 
tricolour  flag  has  travelled  around  the  world  with  our 
glory,  the  red  flag  has  travelled  around  the  Champ  de 
Mars  only."  And  the  tricolour  continued  to  wave 
triumphant  in  the  breeze. 

He  spent  his  genius,  his  health,  his  fortune  in  this 
business    with    the    most    generous    carelessness.     He 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

made  the  greatest  human  effort  that  ever  was  tried ;  he 
stood  alone  against  an  unbridled  multitude.  For  sev- 
eral days  he  it  was  who  saved  France  and  gave  her 
time  to  await  better  times.  And  as  nothing  is  so  un- 
grateful as  terror,  once  peril  is  past,  he  lost  his  popu- 
larity. Those  who  owed  him  their  lives  perhaps,  their 
riches  and  their  safety  unquestionably,  thought  him 
ridiculous  when,  after  having  thrown  to  the  winds  for 
their  benefit  all  his  treasure,  with  the  noble  confidence 
of  the  poet  who  thinks  he  may  ask  for  a  drachma  in 
return  for  a  talent  from  those  whom  he  had  spellbound 
and  preserved,  he  sat  down  on  the  threshold  of  his 
ruined  home  and,  holding  out  his  helmet,  said,  "  Date 
obolum  Belisario."  Debts  were  behind  him,  forcing 
him  to  hold  out  his  hand. 

He  was  certainly  a  great  enough  man  to  play  with 
his  creditors  the  scene  between  Don  Juan  and  M. 
Dimanche,  but  he  would  not  do  it,  and  France  beheld 
the  sad  spectacle  of  the  poet  growing  old  and  bowed 
from  dawn  till  night  under  the  yoke  of  paying  copy. 
The  demigod  who  remembered  heaven  wrote  novels, 
pamphlets,  and  articles  like  us.  Pegasus  cut  his  furrow, 
dragging  a  plough  which,  had  he  outstretched  his  wings, 
he  could  have  carried  away  amid  the  stars. 

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Portraits    of  the    Day 


ALFRED    DE   VIGNY 

BORN  IN  1799  —  DIED  IN  1863 

COUNT  ALFRED  DE  VIGNY  was  one  of 
the  most  illustrious  members  of  the  Roman- 
ticist school,  and  although  his  reserved  and 
refined  nature  led  him  to  keep  apart  from  the  crowd,  he 
did  not  fear  to  face  it  when  the  sacred  doctrine  was  at 
stake.  In  spite  of  his  dislike  for  the  rough  battles  of 
the  stage,  he  translated  Shakespeare's  u  Othello  "  with 
courageous  fidelity  and  braved  the  stormy  pit.  This 
translation,  in  which  accuracy  never  turns  into  awk- 
wardness, and  which  has  all  the  freedom  of  an  original 
work,  has  not  remained  in  the  repertory,  and  it  was 
only  after  an  interval  of  about  thirty  years  that  Rouviere 
brought  out  again  and  performed  "  The  Moor  of 
Venice  "  upon  a  Boulevard  stage.  The  preface,  which 
is  a  masterpiece  of  grace,  wit,  and  irony,  is  full  of  ideas 
new  at  that  time  and  still  new  to-day. 

Few  writers  have  realised  the  ideal  of  a  poet  as  fully 
as  Alfred  de  Vigny.      Of  noble  birth,  bearing  a  name  as 

171 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

melodious  as  the  sound  of  the  lyre,  of  seraphic  beauty, 
which  even  in  his  later  age  suffering  alone  could  dimin- 
ish, rich  enough  not  to  be  driven  by  vulgar  necessity 
to  wretched  labours  day  by  day,  he  preserved  his  pure, 
calm,  and  poetic  literary  physiognomy.  He  was  indeed 
the  poet  of  Eloa,  the  virgin  born  of  a  tear  of  Christ, 
who  came  down,  drawn  by  pity,  to  console  Lucifer. 
This  poem,  which  is  perhaps  the  most  beautiful  and 
the  most  perfect  in  the  French  language,  could  have 
been  written  by  no  one  but  de  Vigny,  even  amid  all 
that  company  of  great  poets  who  shone  in  the  heaven 
of  letters ;  he  alone  knew  the  secret  of  those  pearly 
grays,  of  those  soft  reflections,  of  that  blue  moonlight, 
which  make  the  immaterial  visible  against  the  white 
background  of  the  divine  light.  But  the  men  of  to- 
day appear  to  have  forgotten  "  Eloa ; "  it  is  rarely 
spoken  of  or  quoted,  though  a  priceless  gem  set  in  the 
golden  gates  of  the  tabernacle.  "Symeta,"  "Dolo- 
rida,"  "  The  Horn,"  "  The  Serieuse  Frigate,"  exhibit 
in  every  part  exquisite  concordance  between  form  and 
thought ;  they  are  priceless  flagons  holding  concen- 
trated essences  the  perfume  of  which  never  dies. 

Like  all   the  artists  of  the  new   school,  Alfred   de 
Vigny  wrote  as  well  in  prose  as  in  verse.      He  gave  us 

172 


ALFRED    DE    VIGNY 

u  Cinq-Mars,"  the  novel  which  in  our  literature  comes 
closest  to  Walter  Scott's  work ;  "  Stello,"  "  Military 
Grandeur  and  Servitude,"  in  which  is  "  The  Red 
Seal,"  a  masterpiece  of  description,  interest,  and  feeling 
which  it  is  impossible  to  read  without  tears  springing 
to  one's  eyes ;  "  Chatterton,"  his  great  success  ;  "  The 
Marechale  d'Ancre,"  a  drama  which  proved  to  be  a 
semi-failure  j  "  Getting  ofF  with  a  Fright,"  a  delightful 
pastel ;  and  a  translation  of  "  The  Merchant  of  Ven- 
ice," which  ought  to  be  performed  as  a  homage  to  his 
memory  in  these  days  of  ours,  when  masterpieces 
are  none  too  numerous. 

Never  did  poetry  have  a  more  ardent  defender  than 
de  Vigny,  and  although  Sainte-Beuve  did  say  of  him, 
very  kindly  and  with  admiration,  when  speaking  of  the 
battles  of  the  Romanticist  school,  "  De  Vigny,  more 
reserved,  before  noon  returned  within  his  ivory  tower," 
yet  from  the  depths  of  his  retreat  he  maintained  the 
sacred  rights  of  thought  against  the  oppression  of  mate- 
rial things ;  he  loudly  claimed,  though  he  possessed 
both,  leisure  and  bread  for  the  poet.  That  was  his 
fixed  idea.  He  developed  it  in  every  possible  aspect  in 
"  Stello  "  and  in  "  Chatterton  "  ;  he  bestowed  upon  it 
the  dazzling  consecration  of  the  drama.  He  rightly 

173 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

looks  upon  the  poet  as  the  pariah  of  modern  civilisa- 
tion, driven  out  during  his  lifetime  and  stripped  after 
his  death,  for  he  alone  cannot  bequeath  to  posterity 
the  fruit  of  his  work. 

When  we  think  of  de  Vigny,  we  involuntarily 
imagine  him  like  a  swan,  moving  along,  his  head 
somewhat  bent  back,  his  wings  half  filled  with  the 
breeze,  floating  upon  those  transparent  waters  of  Eng- 
lish parks,  a  Virginia  water  rayed  with  a  moonbeam 
that  filters  through  the  dull  green  of  the  foliage  of  the 
willows.  He  is  the  white  light  in  a  beam,  a  silver 
streak  on  a  limpid  mirror,  a  sigh  amid  water  flowers 
and  pale  foliage.  He  may  also  be  compared  to  one  of 
the  nebulous  milky  drops  on  the  blue  bosom  of  the 
heaven,  which  shine  less  than  other  stars  because  they 
are  placed  higher  and  farther  away. 


Portraits  of  the  D  ay 


CHATTERTON 

DECEMBER,  1857 


ONE  of  the  deep  impressions  of  my  youth  was 
made  upon  me  by  the  first  performance 
of  "  Chatterton,"  which  took  place,  as 
every  one  knows,  on  February  12,  1835.  So  the 
other  evening,  when  I  was  going  to  the  Theatre-Fran- 
cais,  I  felt  a  certain  uneasiness,  in  no  wise  caused,  I 
hasten  to  say,  by  the  talent  of  Alfred  de  Vigny,  —  I 
was  uncertain  about  myself.  Would  I  feel  again  the 
emotions  of  my  youth,  the  artless  and  trustful  enthusi- 
asm, the  perfect  consonance  with  the  work,  all  the 
feelings  which  then  animated  me  ?  When  age  has 
come,  as  a  great  poet  has  said,  one  must  avoid  coming 
across  the  opinions  or  the  women  one  loved  at  twenty. 
My  admiration,  however,  was  more  fortunate. 

When  "  Chatterton "  was  first  performed,  it  was 
even  more  distinct  from  the  general  run  of  plays  than 
it  is  to-day.  That  was  the  heyday  of  the  historical, 
Shakespearean  drama,  filled  with  incidents,  crowded 

175 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

with  characters,  bedizened  with  local  colour,  full  of  fire 
and  fury.  Buffoonery  and  lyric  poetry  rubbed  elbows 
in  it  in  accordance  with  the  prescribed  formula.  The 
cap  and  bells  of  the  court  jester  were  heard  in  it,  and 
the  good  Toledo  blade,  so  much  ridiculed  since  then, 
thrust  and  carved  all  the  time.  In  "  Chatterton  "  the 
drama  is  intimate;  it  is  merely  the  exposition  of  an 
idea.  There  are  no  facts,  there  is  no  action,  save 
perchance  the  suicide  of  the  poet  which  is  anticipated 
from  the  first  word,  so  it  was  not  supposed  that  the 
work  could  possibly  succeed  on  the  stage ;  and  yet,  in 
spite  of  the  previsions  of  experts,  its  success  was  main- 
tained. Youth  in  those  days  was  intoxicated  with  art, 
passion,  and  poetry.  All  heads  were  turned,  all  hearts 
were  beating  high  with  boundless  emotion,  the  fate  of 
Icarus  affrighted  no  one.  "  Wings !  wings  !  wings  !  " 
was  the  cry  heard  on  all  hands ;  "  wings !  even  if  we 
must  fall  into  the  sea.  To  fall  from  heaven,  one  must 
have  risen  there,  even  were  it  but  for  a  second,  and 
that  is  nobler  than  to  crawl  all  one's  life  upon  earth." 
Such  exaltation  may  seem  absurd  to  the  generation 
which  is  now  as  old  as  we  were  then,  but  it  was  sin- 
cere, and  many  proved  it  over  whom  the  grass  has 
grown  thick  and  green  for  many  a  day.  The  pit  be- 

176 


CHATTERTON 


fore  which  Chatterton  declaimed  his  lines  was  full  of 
wan,  long-haired  youths,  firmly  convinced  that  there 
was  no  other  decent  occupation  on  earth  than  writing 
verse  or  painting,  —  art,  as  they  then  said,  —  and  who 
looked  down  upon  the  bourgeois  with  a  contempt  which 
that  of  the  Heidelberg  or  Jena  students  for  the  Philis- 
tines scarcely  approaches.  The  bourgeois,  —  why,  they 
included  pretty  nearly  everybody  :  bankers,  stockbrok- 
ers, lawyers,  merchants,  shop-keepers,  and  others  ; 
whoever,  in  a  word,  did  not  form  part  of  the  mystic 
circle,  but  prosaically  earned  his  living.  Never  did 
such  a  thirst  for  glory  burn  human  lips.  As  for 
money,  no  one  gave  it  a  thought.  More  than  one  in 
those  days,  as  in  that  enumeration  of  impossible  pro- 
fessions which  Theodore  de  Banville  relates  with  such 
irony,  —  more  than  one  might  have  exclaimed,  with 
perfect  truth,  "  I  am  a  lyric  poet  and  I  live  by  my  pro- 
fession." Whoever  has  not  lived  during  that  mad, 
hot,  over-excited,  but  generous  time  cannot  imagine  to 
what  an  extent  the  forgetfulness  of  material  life,  the 
intoxication,  or,  if  you  will,  the  infatuation  of  art  car- 
ried obscure  and  frail  victims,  who  preferred  to  die  of 
it  rather  than  to  give  up  their  dream.  In  vain  did  men 
hear  during  the  night  the  report  of  solitary  pistols. 

177 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

You  may  judge,  then,  of  the  effect  produced  upon  such 
people  by  the  "  Chatterton  "  of  Alfred  de  Vigny, 
which,  to  be  understood,  must  be  replaced  in  the 
atmosphere  of  the  time  at  which  it  was  written. 

The  noble  author,  whose  personal  means  always 
kept  him  free  from  such  troubles,  was  always  greatly 
interested  in  the  fate  of  poets  in  our  society.  He 
developed  his  views  at  great  length  in  "  Stello,  or  The 
Consultations  of  the  Black  Doctor,"  of  which  "  Chat- 
terton "  is  but  an  episode  worked  over  for  the  stage.  His 
eager  sympathy,  his  feminine  sensibility,  his  warmth  of 
pity  make  Alfred  de  Vigny  understand  and  share  the 
sufferings  of  delicate  souls,  hurt  by  brutal  contact  with 
reality.  He  claims  for  them  life  and  reverie, — -in 
other  words,  bread  and  leisure.  As  one  listens  to  him 
every  one  agrees  with  him,  so  eloquent  is  he.  And 
yet  who  shall  judge  whether  the  poet  is  truly  a  poet, 
and  whether  society  ought  to  maintain  him  in  leisure 
before  inspiration  has  come  to  him  from  heaven  ?  Are 
we  to  believe  in  the  affirmations  of  pride,  the  advice  of 
critics,  or  popular  renown  ?  For,  once  he  has  attained 
renown,  the  writer  no  longer  needs  help. 

I  do  not  think  that  any  one  ever  lived  absolutely 
on  poetry  save  those  who  died  of  it.  Poetry  is  not  a 

178 


CHATTERTON 


permanent  state  of  the  soul  ;  the  god  visits  the  best  en- 
dowed men  but  from  time  to  time  ;  the  will  has  little 
or  no  action  upon  it.  Alone  among  art  workers,  the 
poet  cannot  be  laborious,  for  his  work  does  not  depend 
upon  himself.  No  one,  —  I  say  it  without  fear  of 
being  contradicted  even  by  the  most  illustrious,  —  no 
one  is  certain  of  having  finished  by  evening  the  poem 
which  he  began  in  the  morning,  even  if  it  contains  but 
a  few  stanzas.  He  must  remain  bent  over  his  desk, 
waiting  until  from  the  confused  swarm  of  rimes 
one  detaches  itself  and  alights  on  his  pen  ;  or  else  he 
must  rise  and  pursue  in  woods  and  streets  the  thought 
which  escapes  him.  Verse  is  made  of  reverie,  time, 
and  chance,  of  a  tear  or  a  smile,  a  perfume  or  a 
remembrance.  A  stanza,  forgotten  in  a  corner  of 
the  memory  like  a  larva  in  its  cocoon,  suddenly  wakens 
and  flies  off  with  a  rustling  of  wings  ;  its  time  to  bloom 
has  come.  In  the  midst  of  a  very  different  occupation 
or  of  a  serious  conversation,  invisible  lips  whisper  in 
your  ear  the  word  that  you  lack,  and  the  ode,  suspended 
for  months,  is  now  finished.  How  can  such  work  be 
appreciated,  and  especially  how  can  it  be  remunerated  ? 
The  idea  of  a  man  exclusively  a  poet,  of  a  poet  living 
on  his  work,  cannot  therefore  be  maintained.  Because 


I 


179 


************************ 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

some  poems  have  been  highly  remunerated,  it  is  not  to 
be  inferred  that  their  authors  could  always  have  paid 
their  way  with  that  single  resource.  It  is  an  accident, 
quite  a  modern  one,  due  to  reasons  which  it  would  not 
be  difficult  to  state,  and  which  have  no  bearing  upon 
pure  poetry. 

I  am  aware  that  Alfred  de  Vigny  does  not  present 
u  Chatterton "  as  a  generalisation,  but  as  a  painful 
exception.  That  unhappy  youth  could  never  have 
resigned  himself  to  live ;  even  had  he  never  lacked 
for  bread,  he  would  have  wrapped  himself  and  died 
in  his  solitary  pride.  When  the  curtain,  on  rising, 
showed  us  the  stage-setting  somewhat  faded  by  time, 
with  its  brown  wainscoting,  its  greenish  windows,  and 
the  wooden  stairs,  down  which  poor  Kitty  Bell  falls 
at  the  close  of  the  play,  I  looked  in  vain  for  Joanny 
upon  the  Quaker's  chair,  and  on  the  other  side  for  poor 
Madame  Dorval.  Geffroy  alone  stood  in  the  centre 
of  the  stage,  pale,  dressed  in  black,  grown  older  like 
everybody  by  some  twenty-two  years,  which  is  perhaps 
a  good  deal  for  the  poet  who  is  only  eighteen,  but  pre- 
serving the  true  spirit  of  the  time,  the  deep  meaning  of 
the  work,  the  bitter,  romantic,  and  fatal  aspect  which 
delighted  men  in  1835. 

180 


CHATTERTON 


The  first  part  of  the  play  seemed  somewhat  cold, 
especially  to  the  spectators  of  the  present  generation, 
whose  interests  are  so  different  from  those  of  the  men 
of  former  days.  John  Bell,  accurate,  positive,  right- 
eous according  to  law,  with  his  practical  and  well-nigh 
irrefutable  reasons,  formerly  excited  violent  antipathy  ; 
he  was  hated  like  the  melodrama  traitor,  covered  with 
the  blackest  of  crimes  ;  and  when,  like  a  commercial 
Bluebeard,  he  called  upon  his  wife  to  account  for  a 
few  pounds  not  entered  upon  the  books,  a  shudder 
ran  through  the  theatre.  People  dreaded  to  see  him 
behead  the  trembling  Kitty  Bell  with  the  edge  of  a  flat 
ruler.  Many  a  young,  romantic  woman,  with  pale 
complexion  and  long  English  curls,  turned  her  eyes 
in  melancholy  fashion  upon  her  husband,  the  classic 
husband,  well  fed  and  rosy,  as  if  to  draw  attention  to 
the  parallel.  Now  John  Bell,  who  objects  to  his 
machines  being  broken,  and  who  affirms  that  a  man 
is  bound  to  pay  by  assiduous  work  for  his  share  of  the 
banquet  of  life  or  leave  the  table  if  he  has  no  money, 
as  rigorous  to  others  as  he  has  been  to  himself,  strikes 
us  as  the  one  reasonable  character  in  the  play. 

The  Quaker,  notwithstanding  his  excellent  inten- 
tions, talks  very  childishly,  and  gives  the  impression, 

181 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

as  he  sits  on  his  chair,  of  a  patriarch  in  his  dotage. 
Kitty  Bell  loves  chastely  the  penniless  youth  who  only 
writes  verses  and  walks  about  with  gestures  and  de- 
claiming verses,  who  is  lean  under  his  thin,  worn, 
black  coat.  Not  a  woman  understands  her  now,  and 
most  young  girls  think  her  absurd,  for  the  modern 
maiden's  ideal  hero  alights  from  a  coupe,  wears  neat 
boots,  suede  gloves,  has  a  cigar  in  his  mouth,  and  in  his 
pocket  a  purse  stuffed  with  bank-notes  and  gold.  In 
1835  it  seemed  quite  natural  to  fall  in  love  with  Chat- 
terton,  but  how  are  we  to-day  to  take  any  interest 
in  an  individual  who  has  neither  capital,  income, 
\  houses  nor  real  estate  ?  —  a  man  who  will  not  even 
accept  a  position,  because,  forsooth,  he  has  written 
"  The  Battle  of  Hastings,"  made  up  of  imitations  of 
the  old  Anglo-Saxon  chronicles;  and  especially  be- 
cause he  is  a  man  of  genius  ?  The  Lord  Mayor  and 
the  young  noblemen  in  their  scarlet  coats  strike  us  now 
as  very  good-natured  to  take  so  much  trouble  about 
that  surly  maniac,  and  to  keep  on  seeking  him  out 
with  so  much  persistency.  People  do  not  take  so 
much  trouble  nowadays,  and  lords  do  not  climb  the 
stairs  of  garrets  where  poets,  nowadays  at  least,  starve 
to  death  at  leisure  if  such  is  their  good  pleasure ;  for 

182 


CHATTERTON 


once  a  man   ceases  to  be  a  poet,  he  ought  to  say  so  ; 
life  again  becomes  possible. 

Nevertheless,  the  slowly  elaborated  emotion  was  at 
last  attained,  when  was  seen  the  bare,  cold  room, 
scarce  lighted  by  a  dying  lamp,  and  into  which  the 
moon  shone  through  the  dirty  panes  with  its  white  gleam 
and  its  dead  face,  the  sad  and  sole  companion  of  an 
agonising  soul,  the  weakening  inspirer  of  unfinished, 
hopeless  work.  The  narrow  bed,  resembling  a  coffin 
more  than  a  bed  and  better  fitted  for  a  body  than  for  a 
living  frame,  on  the  side  of  which/Chatterton  seeks  to 
force  his  virgin  thought  to  sell  itself  for  gold  as  does  a 
courtesan/produced  a  sinister  effect.  More  than  one 
writer  in  that  theatre  recognised  in  it  the  representa- 
tion, exaggerated  no  doubt  but  true  at  bottom,  of  his 
own  weariness,  his  own  intellectual  struggle,  his  own 
moments  of  despair.  Doubtless  it  is  hard  when 
Chimera  smiles  upon  you  with  her  languorously  per- 
fidious smile,  caresses  you  with  eyes  whose  strange 
gleams  promise  love,  happiness,  and  glory,  brushes  your 
brow  with  its  wings  as  it  flies  off  into  the  infinite, 
and  lets  you  familiarly  place  your  hand  upon  its  lion's 
quarters,  —  it  is  hard  to  let  her  fly  away  alone,  annoyed 
and  contemptuous  like  a  woman  whose  confession  has 

183 


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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

not  been  understood,  and  to  have  thereafter  to  harness 
one's  self  to  the  heavy  drag  of  a  piece  of  work  ordered 
beforehand.  But  what  are  you  going  to  do  about  it? 
Cling  to  some  duty,  to  some  love,  to  some  devotion, 
transform  the  price  paid  for  that  task-work  into  security, 
comfort,  happiness  for  loved  ones,  and  graciously  sac- 
rifice your  pride  on  the  altar  of  domestic  life.  Well, 
in  that  case,  you  will  be  neither  Homer  nor  Dante  nor 
Shakespeare,  even  had  you  been  one  of  them  if  you 
had  only  written  verse.  The  worst  of  it  is  that  Pega- 
sus, as  may  be  seen  in  Schiller's  ballad,  is  never,  even 
when  he  condescends,  a  very  good  horse  for  the  plough. 
He  cuts  some  straight  furrows  and  then  he  is  off,  he 
opens  his  great  wings,  breaks  his  traces,  or  if  he  can- 
not do  so,  carries  off  with  him  the  ploughman  and  the 
plough,  which  he  may  let  fall  by  and  by,  broken  and 
shattered.  The  truth  is  that  poetry  is  a  fatal  gift,  a 
sort  of  curse  to  him  who  has  received  it  at  his  birth. 
A  great  fortune  even  does  not  always  prevent  a  poet 
from  being  unhappy.  Byron's  example  is  sufficient 
proof  of  this. 

The  close  of  the  play  moved  the  spectators  as  deeply 
as  at  the  original  performances.  The  purest  and  most 
violent  passion  fills  it  from  end  to  end.  Now  it  is  no 

184 


CHATTERTON 


longer  a  question  of  literature  or  poetry.  As  soon  as 
Chatterton  has  made  up  his  mind  to  die,  he  becomes  a 
man  again  and  ceases  to  be  an  abstraction  ;  the  drama 
passes  from  the  brain  into  the  heart  ;  suppressed  love 
breaks  forth.  Death  is  the  third  character  in  this 
supreme  interview,  and  when  Chatterton's  lips  touch 
the  immaculate  brow  of  Kitty  Bell,  that  last  kiss  tells 
the  poor  woman  that  the  wretched  youth  is  about  to 
die.  John  Bell  may  call  as  loudly  as  he  pleases,  the 
timid  creature  will  not  reply,  but  from  the  threshold  of 
the  death  room  will  pitch  down  the  stairs  and  fall  upon 
her  knees,  hiding  her  innocently  guilty  head  between 
the  tear-wet  leaves  of  her  Bible. 

The  character  of  Kitty  Bell,  the  angelic  Puritan, 
the  earthly  sister  of  Eloa,  is  drawn  with  almost  ideal 
purity.  How  chaste  is  her  love,  how  concealed 
and  contained  her  passion,  how  deep  her  modesty. 
Scarcely  is  her  secret  betrayed  by  a  despairing  sob, 
at  the  last  moment.  Every  one  knows  that  the  part 
was  one  of  the  greatest  successes  of  Madame  Dorval  j 
never  perhaps  did  that  superb  actress  rise  so  high. 
She  played  it  with  timid  English  grace  ;  she  managed 
in  most  motherly  fashion  the  two  babes,  pure  interme- 
diaries of  unconfessed  love  ;  she  displayed  the  sweetest 

185 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

feminine  charity  towards  the  forsaken  youth  of  genius 
rebelling  against  fate;  she  sought  with  light  touch  to 
soothe  the  wounds  of  his  suffering  pride.  She  ad- 
dressed to  him  the  very  beating  of  her  heart,  the  very 
caresses  of  her  soul,  in  the  slow  words  she  spoke  to 
him,  her  eyes  cast  down,  her  hands  resting  on  the 
heads  of  her  two  dear  little  ones  as  if  to  seek  strength 
against  herself.  And  what  an  agonising  cry  she 
uttered,  what  forgetfulness  of  herself  she  exhibited 
when  she  rolled,  struck  down  by  grief,  down  the  steps 
which  she  had  climbed  with  convulsive  effort,  with 
almost  mad  jerks,  well-nigh  on  her  knees,  her  feet 
caught  in  her  dress,  her  arms  outstretched,  her  soul 
projected  out  of  the  body  which  could  not  follow  it ! 

Ah !  if  Chatterton  had  for  the  last  time  opened  his 
eyes  weighed  down  by  opium  and  seen  that  dreadful 
grief,  he  would  have  died  happy,  sure  that  he  had 
been  loved  as  no  one  ever  was,  and  that  he  would  not 
long  await  in  another  world  the  soul  which  was  kin 
to  his  own. 


186 


Portraits   of  the   D  ay 


PAUL    DE    KOCK 

BORN  IN  1794  —  DIED  IN  1870 


THERE  is  nothing  new  but  what  has  been 
forgotten,  and  probably  no  one  among  the 
younger  generation  of  to-day  has  any  idea 
of  the  great  reputation  which  Paul  de  Kock  enjoyed 
some  thirty  or  forty  years  ago.  There  never  was  an 
author  more  popular  in  the  real  meaning  of  the  word. 
He  was  read  by  everybody,  by  the  statesman  as  well  as 
by  the  commercial  traveller  and  the  schoolboy,  by  the 
great  ladies  in  society  and  by  the  grisettes.  He  was 
as  famous  abroad  as  at  home,  and  Russians  studied 
Parisian  manners  in  the  pages  of  his  novels.  The 
Romanticist  school,  with  its  lofty,  chivalrous  senti- 
ments, its  lyrical  outbursts,  its  love  for  the  Middle 
Ages  and  local  colour,  its  exaggerated  idea  of  passion, 
its  wealth  of  Shakespearean  metaphors,  caused  this 
modest  glory  to  pale  and  extinguished  its  beams  with 
its  own  dazzling  splendour. 

187 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

Paul  de  Kock,  to  his  credit  be  it  said,  was  a  true 
bourgeois,  a  Philistine  of  the  Marais,  utterly  devoid  of 
feeling  for  poetry  or  style.  He  had  never  been  a 
student,  and  had  not  the  faintest  idea  of  aesthetics ;  in- 
deed, he  would  readily  have  supposed,  like  Pradon,  that 
they  were  some  chemical  substance.  He  was  wholly 
devoid  of  the  artistic  temperament, —  I  do  not  say  this 
with  any  ironical  intention ;  I  mean  that  he  possessed 
the  qualities  which  are  necessary  to  a  man  who  is  to 
become  popular  with  the  masses.  Paul  de  Kock  had 
the  advantage  of  being  absolutely  like  his  readers.  He 
shared  their  ideas,  their  opinions,  their  prejudices,  their 
feelings.  He  possessed,  however,  a  special  gift,  that 
of  exciting  laughter;  not  the  Attic  laughter,  but  the 
loud,  coarse  laugh,  absurdly  irresistible,  which  makes, 
as  the  saying  is,  people  split  their  sides.  Paul  de 
Kock  called  out  that  laugh  by  comic  situations  in 
doubtful  taste,  ridiculous,  unexpected  happenings,  gro- 
tesque amusements,  the  breaking  of  crockery,  the 
splashing  of  gravy,  by  kicks  and  boxes  on  the  ear 
which  always  went  to  the  wrong  person,  and  other 
unfailing  clownish  tricks.  It  is  true  that  his  work 
is  coarsely  done,  lacks  wit,  and  is  heavy  in  its  out- 
lines ;  but  his  fanciful  characters,  which  tumble  one 

188 


PAUL    DE    KQCK 


over  another  like  cardboard  figures,  possess  a  force 
and  truthfulness  and  a  touch  of  nature  which  must  be 
acknowledged. 

Now  Paul  de  Kock  has  become  an  historical  author. 
His  works  contain  the  description  of  manners  in  a  civ- 
ilisation differing  as  greatly  from  our  own  as  does  that 
the  traces  of  which  are  found  in  Pompeii  ;  his  novels, 
which  people  read  formerly  for  amusement's  sake,  will 
henceforth  be  consulted  by  erudites  desirous  of  recreat- 
ing life  in  that  old  Paris  which  I  knew  in  my  youth 
and  of  which  the  vestiges  will  soon  have  vanished. 

Those  who  were  born  after  the  Revolution  of  Feb- 
ruary 24,  1848,  or  shortly  before  that  date,  cannot 
understand  the  Paris  in  which  the  heroes  and  heroines 
of  Paul  de  Kock  moved,  lived,  and  had  their  being. 
It  was  so  utterly  unlike  the  present  Paris  that  some- 
times I  ask  myself,  as  I  gaze  upon  the  broad  streets, 
the  long  boulevards,  the  vast  squares,  the  endless  lines 
of  monumental  houses,  the  splendid  quarters  which 
have  been  built  upon  old  market-gardens,  if  that  is  in- 
deed the  city  in  which  my  childhood  was  passed. 

Paris,  which  is  becoming  the  metropolis  of  the 
world,  was  then  only  the  capital  of  France.  French- 
men, and  even  Parisians,  were  to  be  met  on  its  streets. 

189 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

Of  course,  foreigners  came  to  it,  as  they  have  always 
done,  for  pleasure  or  instruction,  but  means  of  commu- 
nication were  difficult,  the  ideal  of  rapidity  did  not  go 
beyond  the  classical  stage-coach,  and  the  locomotive 
steam-engine  was  not  even  visible  as  a  chimera  within 
the  mists  of  the  future ;  so  that  the  general  appearance 
of  the  population  was  not  markedly  modified. 

The  inhabitants  of  the  provinces  remained  at  home 
much  more  than  they  do  now,  they  troubled  Paris  only 
when  called  to  it  by  urgent  business.  You  could  hear 
French  spoken  on  the  Boulevard,  which  was  then 
called  Boulevard  de  Gand,  and  which  now  bears 
the  name  of  Boulevard  des  Italiens.  You  could 
meet  frequently  with  a  type  which  is  now  becoming 
rare,  and  which  for  us  is  the  true  Parisian  type  :  fair 
skin,  rosy  cheeks,  brown  hair,  light-gray  eyes,  short 
stature,  but  a  good  figure,  and  in  women  a  delicate 
plumpness  and  small  bones.  Olive  complexions  and 
black  hair  were  rare  at  that  time ;  the  South  had  not 
yet  invaded  Paris,  bringing  with  it  its  complexion 
of  passionate  paleness,  its  brilliant  eyes,  and  its  mad 
gesticulations.  The  general  appearance  of  faces  then 
was  rosy  and  smiling,  with  a  look  of  health  and  good- 
humour;  the  complexions  which  nowadays  are  con- 

190 


PAUL    DE    KOCK 


sidered  distinguished  would  at  that  time  have  suggested 
illness. 

The  city  was,  relatively  speaking,  very  small,  —  that 
is,  business  was  restricted  within  certain  limits  beyond 
which  people  rarely  went.  The  plaster  elephant,  in 
which  Gavroche  used  to  take  refuge,  then  rose  gigantic 
behind  the  Place  de  la  Bastille,  and  seemed  to  forbid 
people  to  walk  farther.  The  Champs-Elysees  became, 
as  soon  as  night  fell,  as  dangerous  as  the  plain  of 
Marathon;  the  boldest  would  stop  at  the  Place  de  la 
Concorde.  The  quarter  of  Notre-Dame-de-Lorette 
then  consisted  merely  of  waste  ground  and  fenced- 
in  spaces.  The  church  itself  was  not  built,  and 
from  the  Boulevard  could  be  seen  the  Hill  of  Mont- 
martre,  with  its  wind-mills  and  the  long  arms  of  the 
semaphore  on  the  top  of  the  old  tower.  The  Fau- 
bourg Saint-Germain  went  to  bed  early,  and  only  on 
rare  occasions  did  a  student  riot,  provoked  by  a  play  at 
the  Odeon,  disturb  its  tranquil  solitude.  Trips  from 
one  quarter  to  another  were  less  frequent.  Omnibuses 
were  not  in  existence,  and  there  were  marked  differ- 
ences in  aspect,  dress,  and  accent  between  the  inhabi- 
tants of  the  Rue  du  Temple  and  those  of  the  Rue 
Montmartre.  The  sewer  in  the  Vieille  Rue  du  Tem- 

191 


************************ 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

pie  was  only  half  covered  in ;  the  walls  of  the  boule- 
vard remained  along  almost  its  entire  length,  with  streets 
lower  down  leading  out  on  the  site  of  the  old  moats. 
Great  woodyards,  the  piles  of  lumber  in  which  formed 
symmetrical  designs,  lay  at  the  end  of  the  Rue  des 
Filles-du-Calvaire,  and  farther  away,  through  the  blue 
haze  in  the  distance,  showed  the  hill  of  Menilmon- 
tant.  At  this  point  in  the  Boulevard  rose  the  res- 
taurant of  la  Galiotte,  which  was  the  scene  of 
so  many  a  joyous  meal  and  so  many  a  pleasant 
party.  Farther  on,  at  the  corner  of  the  Rue 
Chariot  and  close  to  the  Turkish  Garden,  was  the 
Cadran  Bleu,  dear  to  Paul  de  Kock  and  famous  for 
its  beautiful  oyster-woman  in  her  red  drugget  dress, 
her  great  pearl  oyster-shells  in  her  ears,  and  her  in- 
numerable necklaces.  For  those  were  the  days  of 
beautiful  oyster-women,  of  pretty  lemonade  vendors, 
of  beautiful  charcutieres.  The  Turkish  Garden,  with 
its  Moorish  arch,  its  ostrich-eggs,  and  its  coloured 
windows,  gave  the  impression  of  the  most  splendid 
Oriental  magnificence,  and  people  entered  it  with  a  sort 
of  respectful  awe,  as  if  they  expected  to  see  His 
Highness  face  to  face.  On  the  opposite  side  of  the 
Boulevard  rose  the  theatres  in  which  dramas  and  pan- 

192 


PAUL    DE    KQCK 


tomimes  were  performed,  the  Cafe  de  PEpi-Scie,  the 
sign  of  which  represented  a  harvester  sawing  an  ear  of 
corn,  and  the  mechanical  show  by  M.  Pierre,  where  we 
first  learned  something  of  the  navy. 

Over  all  that  Boulevard,  Paul  de  Kock  reigns  as  a 
master.  He  knows  all  the  bourgeois  who  pass  by,  as 
well  as  their  wives  and  their  daughters  j  he  knows  what 
they  are  thinking  of,  and  the  traditional  jokes  which 
they  will  perpetrate  this  evening  while  playing  at  loto  ; 
but  it  does  not  make  him  indignant  ;  he  enjoys  them, 
he  laughs  at  them  heartily.  Their  courageous  stupidity 
is  pleasant  to  him.  If  these  good  people  arrange  to  go 
picnicking  next  Sunday,  he  will  take  care  to  be  invited, 
and  will  bring  as  his  contribution  a  pasty  or  a  melon. 
While  eating  dinner  on  the  grass,  no  one  will  talk  more 
nonsense  than  he,  and  no  one  at  dessert  will  sing  a 
more  risky  song.  It  is  a  coarse  sort  of  enjoyment,  no 
doubt,  due  to  poor  wine  and  ham,  but  honest,  after  all, 
for  the  whole  family  is  there,  and  the  girls  who  are 
kissed,  and  whose  gingham  dresses,  made  by  themselves, 
are  somewhat  rumpled,  know  very  well  that  their 
lovers  will  ere  long  become  their  husbands. 

At  that  time,  there  were  to  be  found  all  around  Paris, 
numberless  pastoral  places,  —  •  at  least,  which  appeared 

13  193 


************************ 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

pastoral  to  poor  devils  who  had  worked  all  the  week  in 
the  darkness  of  a  shop  ;  little  groves  of  trees,  admirably 
fitted  to  shade  a  tavern,  fishers'  huts  laved  by  the 
stream,  in  which  a  stew  of  small  fry  passed  muster  as 
gudgeon  ;  arbours  of  Virginia  creeper  and  hops,  which 
at  need  served  an  amourous  couple,  as  the  cave  served 
^Eneas  and  Dido;  Romainville,  the  Park  of  Saint- 
Fargeau,  the  Pres-Saint-Gervais,  with  their  clumps  of 
lilac  and  their  fountain,  the  water  of  which  filled  up  a 
small  stone  basin  which  was  reached  by  a  few  steps. 
This  sort  of  landscape  was  sufficient  for  Paul  de  Kock, 
who,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  is  neither  a  picturesque 
writer  nor  a  writer  of  descriptions  after  the  fashion  of 
the  day.  He  thought  it  charming  just  as  it  was,  and 
the  wretched  sward,  diapered  with  greasy  paper  more 
than  with  daisies,  represented  the  country  to  him;  he 
sketched  it  in  passing  as  a  sort  of  background  to 
his  figures ;  but  at  bottom  he  did  not  understand  much 
of  what  is  now  called  nature,  and  in  this  respect  he 
was  truly  French  and  truly  Parisian. 

But  he  did  not  always  confine  his  walks  to  the 
suburbs,  he  sometimes  went  as  far  as  Montmorenci, 
and  then  what  splendid  rides  on  asses'  back  through 
the  forest ;  what  shouts,  what  laughter,  and  what  lucky 

194 


PAUL    DE    KOCK 


tumbles  on  the  sward  !  And  what  delightful  meals  of 
brown  bread  and  cherries  !  True,  the  participants 
were  only  clerks  and  shopgirls,  but  they  were  surely 
just  as  good  as  the  modern  dandies  and  fast  women, 
even  if  one  does  not  care  to  praise  past  times  at  the 
expense  of  the  present,  —  a  defect  of  those  who  were 
young  under  the  former  king.  Unquestionably  the 
grisettes  of  Paul  de  Kock  are  not  as  elegant  as  Alfred 
de  Musset's  "  Mimi  Pinson,"  but  they  are  blooming, 
bright,  jolly,  kind-hearted  girls,  and  as  pretty,  with 
their  percale  caps  or  their  light  straw  hats,  as  the  faces 
covered  with  rouge  and  powder  for  the  sake  of  which 
well-bred  young  men  ruin  themselves  nowadays.  They 
earned  their  own  scanty  living,  careless  as  the  birds 
which  perch  upon  the  gutters  of  the  roofs,  but  their 
love  was  not  for  sale  and  their  hearts  had  first  to  be 
won.  That  charming  race  of  girls  has  vanished,  with 
many  other  good  things  of  old  Paris,  which  now  survive 
only  in  the  novels  of  old  Paul  de  Kock,  whose  name 
will  live  long  after  that  of  some  celebrities  of  the  time, 
for  he  represents  faithfully  and  with  much  spirit  a 
wholly  vanished  epoch.  How  disdainful  is  the  aston- 
ishment with  which  people  now  look  upon  his  fast- 
living  men  who  spent  ten  thousand  a  year,  had  a 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

cabriolet,  —  in  those  days  there  were  cabriolets,  —  drank 
champagne  in  mad  orgies,  and  kept  a  ballet  dancer  of 
the  Gaite  or  the  Ambigu-Comique ;  and  how  con- 
temptuously, no  doubt,  people  now  look  upon  those 
stag  luncheons  consisting  of  a  couple  of  dozen  oysters, 
radishes,  and  fresh-pork  cutlets  surrounded  with  green 
slices  of  cucumber,  which  the  butchers  formerly  sold 
ready  prepared,  with,  for  wine,  a  bottle  or  two  of 
Chablis ;  and  yet  people  enjoyed  them.  But  we  have 
become  more  refined  nowadays,  and  such  pleasures  are 
no  longer  sufficient  for  the  present  generation.  In 
order  to  amuse  itself,  it  has  to  pay,  and  to  pay  very 
dear.  It  is  quite  welcome  to  that.  The  former  some- 
what gross,  but  very  natural  joy  appears  to  people 
nowadays  bad  form.  They  prefer  jokes  in  slang 
borrowed  from  the  dictionaries,  and  the  epileptic  insan- 
ities of  the  libretto  of  the  BoufFes. 

I  the  more  willingly  pay  this  late  tribute  to  Paul  de 
Kock  that,  when  formerly  bearing  a  pennant  in  the 
Romanticist  army,  I  did  not  perhaps  read  his  novels 
with  the  attention  they  deserved.  Besides,  the  things 
he  depicted  were  then  present  to  us  and  their  meaning 
did  not  stand  out  clearly.  Nevertheless,  I  felt  there 
was  in  him  a  sort  of  comic  power  which  others  lacked. 

196 


PAUL    DE    KOCK 


Now  he  appears  to  me  in  a  more  serious  light,  I  will 
even  say  a  melancholy  light,  if  such  a  word  is  appli- 
cable to  Paul  de  Kock.  Some  of  his  novels  have  the 
same  effect  upon  me  as  Fenimore  Cooper's  u  Last  of 
the  Mohicans  "  ;  I  seem  to  read  in  them  the  story  of 
the  last  of  the  Parisians,  invaded  and  submerged  by 
American  civilisation. 


197 


Portraits    of  the    Day 


JULES    DE    GONCOURT 

BORN  IN  1830  —  DIED  IN  1870 

SO  it  is  divided  at  last,  —  that  double  personality 
which  was  familiarly  called  the  Goncourts,  for 
no  one  ever  separated  one  brother  from  the 
other.  Those  who  knew  intimately  these  two  charm- 
ing souls  united  in  a  single  pearl,  like  two  drops  of 
water  that  have  run  together,  were  haunted  by  a  dis- 
quieting, ever  recurring,  terrifying  thought.  It  was  : 
"  Of  those  two  brothers  one  will  die  first  ;  the  natural 
course  of  events  makes  it  certain,  unless  a  happy, 
blessed  catastrophe  strikes  them  down  together  at  one 
and  the  same  time."  But  heaven  does  not  often 
bestow  such  blessings.  The  thought  gnawed  at  my 
heart,  and  I  scarce  dared  to  dwell  on  the  dread  despair 
which  would  be  the  consequence  of  such  a  separation. 
The  little  bit  of  selfishness  which  is  always  to  be  found 
even  in  the  most  disinterested  of  human  friendships 
made  me  repeat  to  myself,  "  I  shall  never  see  that  day. 
As  I  am  older,  I  shall  have  been  dead  for  many  a 

198 


***  £±4.4.  £££  ££4.4.4.4. 4.4:4.4.4, 4.4.4. 

JULES    DE    GONCOURT 

year."  But  it  was  not  to  be  so.  That  day,  as  the 
funeral  hymn  says,  has  come ;  I  was  there,  and  never 
did  a  sadder  sight  strike  my  eyes.  Edmond,  in  his 
tragic  grief,  seemed  like  a  petrified  spectre,  and  death, 
which  usually  sets  a  mark  of  serene  beauty  on  the  face 
which  it  touches,  had  been  unable  to  efface  from  the 
features  of  Jules,  even  and  regular  though  they  were, 
an  expression  of  bitter  grief  and  of  inconsolable  regret. 
It  seemed  as  though  he  had  felt  at  the  last  moment 
that  he  had  no  right  to  die  like  any  one  else,  and  that 
in  doing  so  he  was  almost  committing  fratricide.  The 
dead  in  his  bier  mourned  for  the  living,  unquestionably 
the  more  to  be  pitied  of  the  pair. 

I  followed  at  every  station  of  the  via  crucis  poor 
Edmond,  who,  blinded  by  tears  and  supported  by  his 
friends,  stumbled  at  every  step  as  if  his  feet  caught  in 
his  brother's  shroud.  Like  people  condemned  to  death, 
whose  face  is  strangely  altered  on  the  way  from  the 
prison  to  the  scaffold,  Edmond,  between  Auteuil  and 
the  cemetery  at  Montmartre,  had  grown  twenty  years 
older,  his  hair  had  plainly  turned  white.  This  is  no 
illusion  of  mine,  several  of  those  present  noticed  it 
turning  whiter  and  losing  its  colour  the  nearer  we 
approached  the  fatal  spot  and  the  little  low  door  where 

199 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

the  last  farewell  must  be  spoken.  It  was  lamentable 
and  sinister,  and  never  was  a  funeral  procession  so 
desolate  ;  every  one  wept  or  sobbed  convulsively ;  and 
yet  those  who  walked  behind  that  bier  were  philoso- 
phers, artists,  writers,  tried  in  grief,  lords  of  their  souls, 
masters  of  their  nerves,  and  ashamed  to  betray  emotion. 

The  coffin  having  been  lowered  into  the  narrow 
family  vault  where  but  one  place  is  left,  and  the  last 
farewell  addressed  to  the  friend  who  was  starting  on 
his  first  march  towards  that  bourne  whence  no  traveller 
returns,  one  of  the  relatives  led  Edmond  away  and  we 
returned  to  the  city  in  small  groups,  talking  of  the  dead 
and  of  the  survivor.  Then  we  parted  with  a  pressure 
of  the  hand,  the  firmer  that  it  was  inspired  by  the 
thought  that  it  was  perhaps  the  last  one. 

And  now  I  must  speak  of  the  writer,  though  I  have 
scarcely  strength  to  do  so.  That  worn  face  of  the 
brother,  which  seemed  lighted  by  a  light  from  the  other 
world,  and  looked,  under  the  brilliant  sunshine,  like 
moonlight  in  broad  day,  rises  before  me  like  a  real 
phantom,  and  I  cannot  put  it  aside.  Since  their 
mother's  death,  which  happened  in  1848,  they  had 
never  been  apart  for  an  hour,  and  they  had  so  thor- 
oughly got  into  the  habit  of  this  common  life  that  it 

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JULES    DE    GONCOURT 

was  a  great  event  to  see  one  of  the  Goncourts  alone ; 
the  other  was  certainly  not  very  far  off. 

Yet  they  were  not  twins.  There  was  an  interval  of 
ten  years  between  Edmond  and  Jules.  The  elder  was 
dark,  the  younger  fair,  the  elder  taller  than  the  other ; 
their  faces  even  were  not  alike ;  but  one  felt  that  a 
single  soul  dwelt  in  these  two  bodies ;  they  were  one 
person  in  two  volumes.  The  moral  likeness  was  so 
great  that  it  made  one  forget  physical  unlikeness. 
How  often  I  have  mistaken  Jules  for  Edmond,  and 
continued  with  the  one  brother  a  conversation  I  had 
begun  with  the  other  !  There  was  nothing  to  warn 
you  that  the  person  you  were  speaking  to  was  different. 
Whichever  of  the  two  brothers  happened  to  be  there 
took  up,  without  the  least  hesitation,  the  talk  at  the 
point  where  the  other  had  left  it.  They  had  sacrificed 
their  personality  to  each  other  and  formed  but  a  single 
one,  which  was  called  u  the  Goncourts  "  by  friends, 
and  "  the  Messieurs  Goncourt "  by  those  who  did  not 
know  them.  All  their  letters  were  signed  "  Edmond 
and  Jules."  During  the  ten  years  that  I  was  in- 
timately acquainted  with  them,  I  have  received  but  a 
single  note  which  was  not  signed  by  this  sweet  firm- 
name  ;  —  it  is  the  one  in  which  the  unhappy  survivor 

201 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

told  me,  from  the  depths  of  his  despair,  of  the  death  of 
his  beloved  brother.  How  much  that  widowed  signa- 
ture, testifying  to  his  eternal  loss,  must  have  cost  his 
trembling  hand  ! 

Although  it  is  very  difficult  to  believe  it  of  literary 
men,  yet  nevertheless  it  is  true  that  they  had  but  one 
self-love.  They  never  betrayed  the  secret  of  their 
partnership  in  labour;  neither  of  them  tried  to  obtain 
the  glory  for  himself,  and  that  single  work  produced  by 
two  brains  still  remains  a  mystery  which  no  one  has 
penetrated.  I  myself,  their  friend,  who  am  trying  here 
under  these  sad  circumstances  to  say  what  was  the 
dead  man's  share,  —  cannot  do  it ;  and  besides,  it 
seems  to  me  almost  impious  to  endeavour  to  separate 
what  these  two  souls,  one  of  which  has  now  flown 
away,  wished  to  unite  indissolubly.  Why  should  we 
untie  this  well  plaited  tress,  the  many-coloured  threads 
of  which  are  tressed  in  and  out  at  regular  intervals 
without  knowing  whence  they  came?  I  should  fear 
to  wound  the  brotherly  delicacy  which  desired  but  a 
single  reputation  for  the  work  done  by  the  pair  in 
common. 

As  I  have  already  said,  Jules  de  Goncourt  was  the 
younger  of  the  two  brothers.  He  was  scarcely  thirty- 

202 


************************ 

JULES    DE    GONCOURT 

four,  and  he  appeared  younger  still,  thanks  to  his  fair 
complexion,  to  his  silky,  golden  hair,  and  the  light, 
pale,  golden  moustache  which  showed  on  the  corners 
of  his  richly  coloured  lips.  He  was  always  carefully 
shaved  and  correctly  dressed  like  a  gentleman.  Ener- 
getic black  eyes  marked  his  fine,  sweet  face.  Gener- 
ally he  was  brighter  and  gayer  than  his  brother ;  the 
one  was  the  smile  of  the  other,  but  you  had  to  know 
both  very  well  to  notice  this  slight  difference.  They 
never  took  each  other's  arm  when  walking  ;  the 
younger  preceded  his  brother  by  a  few  steps  with  a  sort 
of  juvenile  petulance  to  which  the  elder  gently  yielded. 
Edmond  had  been  the  literary  initiator  of  Jules,  but  all 
difference  of  style  between  himself  and  his  pupil  had 
long  since  disappeared.  They  thought  and  worked 
together,  according  to  a  plan  which  was  no  doubt  set- 
tled beforehand,  handing  to  each  other  across  the  table 
what  they  had  written  and  summing  it  up  in  a  final 
version.  They  were  curious,  refined  men,  with  a  hor- 
ror of  the  commonplace  and  of  ready-made  phrases. 
To  avoid  the  common  they  would  have  gone  to  excess, 
even  to  paroxysm,  even  to  the  length  of  making  their 
expressions  burst  like  soap  bubbles  over-filled  with  air. 
But  then,  how  carefully  they  polished  their  style ! 

203 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

How  exquisitely  refined  it  was  !  what  a  delicate  and 
novel  choice  of  words  !  When  they  wrote  history, 
they  were  not  satisfied  with  the  documents  which  were 
to  be  easily  found,  printed  in  books  ;  they  referred  to 
original  documents,  to  autographs,  to  unknown  pamph- 
lets, to  secret  memoirs,  to  paintings,  engravings,  fash- 
ion plates,  to  whatever  might  reveal  a  characteristic 
detail  and  revive  the  appearance  of  the  times.  Yet 
they  were  not  novelists  eager  to  load  their  palette  with 
local  colour.  These  two  fashionable  Benedictines 
worked  in  their  dainty  apartments  of  the  rue  Saint- 
George,  filled  with  pretty  bric-a-brac  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  as  seriously  as  if  they  had  been  shut  up 
within  a  monastery.  They  were  scrupulously  accu- 
rate. Every  peculiarity  which  they  mention  is  backed 
up  by  authentic  proof.  The  masters  of  history  and 
criticism,  Michelet  and  Sainte-Beuve,  quote  them  as 
authorities  on  everything  that  concerned  the  reign  of 
Louis  XVI,  the  Revolution,  and  the  Directory,  which 
they  know  thoroughly  and  every  detail  of  which  they 
are  acquainted  with.  In  the  novel  they  attempted  to 
reproduce,  with  implacable  minuteness  and  clear-sighted- 
ness, reality,  which  they  stretched  out  upon  their  table 
like  an  anatomical  subject,  with  a  pen  as  sharp  as  a  dis- 

204 


JULES    DE    GONCOURT 

secting-knife.  It  suffices  to  name  "Sister  Philomene," 
u  Germinie  Lacerteux,"  "  Manette  Salomon,"  u  Renee 
Mauperin,"  in  which  occurs  that  new  and  living  type 
of  the  noisy  young  girl,  and  their  last  work,  "  Madam 
Gervaisais,"  in  which  the  study  of  a  soul  slowly  ab- 
sorbed by  Catholicism  is  mingled  with  magnificent 
descriptions  of  Rome,  wrought  out  like  the  etchings  of 
Piranesi.  With  audacious  originality  they  also  tried 
their  hand  at  drama.  "  Henriette  Marechal  "  failed  to 
please  Master  Briar-pipe,  the  student  in  his  twentieth 
year,  which  is  a  pity,  for  that  undeserved  check  turned 
away  from  the  stage  two  vocations  which  gave  good 
promise.  Besides  these  works  the  Goncourts  produced 
interesting  studies  on  Watteau,  Chardin,  Fragonard, 
Saint-Aubin,  Gravelot,  Eisen,  and  all  the  lesser  masters 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  whom  they  knew  so  well, 
accompanied  by  plates  which  Jules  engraved  in  aqua 
forth.  It  is  impossible  to  reproduce  better  the  charac- 
ter of  the  art  of  an  epoch  unjustly  disdained.  They 
understood  equally  well  the  art  of  Japan,  so  true  and 
so  fanciful,  so  fertile  in  its  invention  of  monstrosities, 
so  astonishingly  natural,  and  they  wrote  upon  it  with 
exquisite  fancy.  Let  me  not  forget  a  book  called 
"  Ideas  and  Sensations,"  which  gives  the  lyric  and 

205 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

dreamy  side  of  their  talent,  and  which  takes  the  place, 
in  their  work,  of  the  volume  of  verse  which  they  did 
not  write.  It  abounds  in  charming  bits,  it  is  full  of 
wit,  it  is  deep  at  times,  and  has  descriptive  passages  of 
the  greatest  novelty.  Did  I  not  fear  that  my  meaning 
would  be  misinterpreted,  I  would  say  that  it  contains 
exquisite  symphonies  of  words.  Words  !  Joubert 
estimates  them  at  their  real  value,  and  compares  them 
to  precious  stones  which  are  set  within  the  verse  like 
diamonds  in  gold.  They  have  their  own  beauty, 
known  to  poets  and  delicate  artists  alone. 

When  an  author  is  spoken  of,  the  titles  of  his  books 
come  up  in  a  mass  and  take  up  all  the  room.  But 
what  did  Jules  die  of?  I  shall  be  asked.  He  died  of 
his  profession,  as  we  shall  all  die;  he  died  of  perpetual 
tension  of  the  mind,  of  effort  without  rest,  of  struggle 
with  difficulties  created  at  will;  of  the  fatigue  of  roll- 
ing that  rock  called  the  phrase,  which  is  heavier  than 
that  of  Sisyphus.  To  anaemia  add  nervousness,  that 
wholly  modern  malady  which  comes  from  the  overex- 
citement  of  civilised  life,  and  which  medicine  is  power- 
less to  relieve,  for  it  cannot  reach  the  soul.  You 
become  irritable,  the  least  noise  worries  you;  you  seek, 
but  too  late,  silent  repose  in  the  shady  woods ;  you  fit 

206 


JULES    DE    GONCOURT 

up  a  house.  "The  house  finished,  death  enters,"  as 
the  Turkish  proverb  says.  Is  that  all  ?  No,  perhaps 
there  was  behind  all  this  some  secret  grief.  Jules  de 
Goncourt,  appreciated,  praised,  lauded  by  the  masters 
of  the  intellect,  lacked  —  what  ?  The  praise  of  fools. 
The  vulgar  is  despised  and  kept  at  a  distance,  but  if  it 
accepts  the  sentence  and  stays  away,  the  proudest 
natures  grieve  and  pine  away. 


207 


Portraits  of  the  D  ay 


JULES  JANIN 


HE  has  been  but  recently  admitted  to  the 
Academy  ;  by  rights,  he  should  have  been 
elected  to  it  twenty  years  ago. 

The  man  who  since  1830  has  every  week  put  his 
initials,  "J.  J.,"  in  the  corner  of  the  'Journal  des 
Debats  owes  to  the  feuilleton  the  best  part  of  his 
glory,  and  for  the  first  time  a  feuilleton  writer  sits  down 
in  the  Academic  arm-chair.  Who  is  amazed  and  de- 
lighted at  such  an  honour  ?  It  is  J.  J.  For  he  is 
modest,  and  the  little  green  embroidery  upon  his  coat 
fulfils  all  his  desires,  —  hoc  erat  in  votis,  shall  I  say,  in 
one  of  those  Latin  quotations  which  he  is  so  fond  of? 
It  is  the  legitimate  and  touching  ambition  of  a  writer 
to  whom  literature  has  always  been  an  end,  and  not 
a  means  of  reaching  something  else.  He  has  fully 
deserved  the  palm  branches  on  his  sleeves  and  his 
collar;  he  was  kept  waiting  for  them  too  long,  but  at 
last  he  has  them  and  we  congratulate  him  upon  the 
fact.  When  a  man  is  neither  a  prince  nor  a  duke,  a 

208 


JULES    JANIN 


bishop  nor  a  monk,  a  minister,  a  great  lawyer,  or  a 
politician,  not  even  a  man  of  the  world,  but  simply 
a  literary  man,  it  is  as  difficult  for  him  to  enter  the 
French  Academy  as  for  a  camel  to  pass  through  the 
eye  of  a  needle. 

At  last  the  feullleton  writer  is  installed  under  the 
cupola  of  the  Mazarin  palace.  For  my  part,  I  am 
glad  of  it,  for  it  is  a  victory  and  a  triumph  of  which 
the  Monday  brethren  have  a  right  to  be  proud.  "  It  is 
not  every  one  who  can  paint  like  Boucher,"  used  to 
say  David,  that  severe  painter,  on  hearing  that  facile 
artist  run  down  by  impotent  disdain.  Writing  feuille- 
tons  is  not  much,  —  that  is  easily  said,  and  thereupon 
the  speaker  shakes  his  head  with  a  lofty  air.  But  I 
should  like  to  see  attempt  it  —  not  for  life,  dl  talem 
avertlte  casum  !  five  years  would  be  enough  —  the 
grave,  the  serious,  the  difficult,  the  sober,  the  solemn, 
the  learned,  all  the  makers  of  compact  weariness,  the 
ornaments  of  reviews  which  one  would  rather  admire 
than  read  ;  the  fruitless  ones  who  glory  in  their  sterility 
and  call  their  retention  of  style  merit. 

Of  course  it  is  easy  to  write  a  dramatic  article,  to 
improvise  every  week  four  or  five  hundred  lines  upon 
the  most  diverse  and  unexpected  subjects  ;  and  brilliant 

14  209 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

lines  full  of  images,  with  endless  wit  scattered  through 
them,  such  as  a  critic  advised  a  gentleman  to  put  into 
his  somewhat  weak  fifth  act ;  lines  rapid  in  their  cor- 
rection and  sure  in  their  impetuous  flow,  full  of  those 
happy  hits  which  are  not  to  be  found  again  by  looking 
for  them,  by  turns  ironical  and  enthusiastic,  mingling 
with  the  thought  of  others  the  fancy  of  the  individual 
writer !  To  do  this  sort  of  work  well,  a  man  must  be 
possessed.  And  therefore  in  this  age,  which  abounds 
in  poets,  historians,  novelists,  and  dramatists,  great 
writers  of  articles  are  much  rarer.  I  can  count  up 
as  many  as  three. 

Now  that  sort  of  article  was  invented  by  Janin, 
Before  him  Geoffrey,  Hoffmann,  Duviquet,  Becquet, 
who  were  clever,  erudite  men  no  doubt,  wrote  dramatic 
notices  in  which  the  good  and  the  bad  features  of 
a  play  were  carefully  noted  and  which  resembled 
corrected  themes.  These  comments  were  written 
in  a  cold,  colourless,  clear  style,  as  transparent  as 
filtered  water  in  a  crystal  carafe,  which  the  French 
naturally  prefer  to  the  rich,  blazing,  varied  colours  of 
gems  and  stained  glass.  A  young  fellow  with  curly 
black  hair,  plump,  rosy  cheeks,  red  lips,  bright  smile, 
came  to  Paris  from  the  Provinces  and  changed  all  that 

210 


JULES    JANIN 


with  his  intoxicating  ardour,  his  joyous  audacity,  his 
high  spirits  which  showed  on  the  least  pretext  in 
bright  smiles  and  sonorous  laughter,  his  ever  ready 
facility,  his  inexhaustible  abundance,  and  a  really  new 
way  of  writing  in  which  every  word  was  equivalent  to 
his  signature. 

Thus  did  he  appear,  healthy,  happy,  among  the 
yallery-greenery,  elegiacal,  Byronic  chorus  of  the  Ro- 
manticists, —  an  original  and  jolly  face,  genuinely 
French.  No  doubt  he  was  a  Romanticist,  like  all 
the  youth  of  that  day,  but  in  his  own  way,  without 
belonging  to  any  set,  with  a  shade  of  undisciplined 
irony  which  questions  while  it  admires.  He  may  have 
preferred  Diderot  to  Shakespeare,  and  he  may  have 
read  more  willingly  "  Rameau's  Nephew  "  than  "  As 
You  Like  It,"  or  "  The  Tempest,"  or  "  A  Midsum- 
mer Night's  Dream."  He  was  satisfied  with  the 
eighteenth  century,  while  we  went  back  to  the  six- 
teenth, kneeling  before  Ronsard  and  the  poets  of  the 
Pleiad.  The  love  of  Latin,  already  so  greatly  devel- 
oped in  him,  seems  to  have  preserved  him  from  the 
enthusiasm  excited  by  exotic  literatures.  He  bowed 
as  he  passed  the  foreign  gods,  whom  he  perhaps  con- 
sidered somewhat  barbaric,  as  the  Athenians  did  what- 

211 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

ever  was  not  Greek  j  but  his  devotion  to  the  imported 
altars  was  never  very  fervent. 

Like  most  of  us  at  that  precocious  time  of  early 
maturity,  he  possessed  his  talent  forthwith  and  his 
first  attempts  were  master-strokes.  Now  that  we  are 
accustomed  to  that  perpetual  wonder,  it  is  impossible 
to  imagine  the  effect  produced  at  that  time  by  his 
thoroughly  new,  youthful,  dainty  style,  charming  in  its 
harmony,  incomparable  in  its  freshness  of  tone,  with 
the  velvet  bloom  of  a  pastel,  set  off  by  a  small  patch, 
with  its  swarm  of  light-winged  phrases  fluttering  here 
and  there  as  if  at  haphazard  under  their  gauze  drapery, 
but  always  finding  their  way  and  bringing  back  flowers 
which  of  themselves  formed  a  dazzling  bouquet  studded 
with  diamonds  of  dew  and  shedding  the  sweetest 
perfumes. 

"  Where  is  he  going  to  ?  "  people  asked  with  the 
uneasiness  so  speedily  dispelled,  called  out  by  cleverly 
performed  feats  of  strength,  when  at  the  beginning  of 
an  article  he  started  from  a  melodrama  or  a  vaudeville 
in  pursuit  of  a  paradox,  a  fancy,  or  a  dream,  interrupt- 
ing himself  to  relate  an  anecdote,  to  run  after  a  butter- 
fly, leaving  his  subject  and  returning  to  it,  opening  in  a 
parenthesis  an  outlook  upon  a  smiling  landscape  or  a 

212 


JULES    JANIN 


glimpse  of  bluish  lane  ending  in  a  jet  of  water  or 
a  statue,  enjoying  himself  like  a  street  boy  who  sets 
off  crackers  between  the  reader's  legs,  and  laughing 
heartily  at  the  involuntary  jump  caused  by  the  explo- 
sion. But  as  he  goes  strolling  along  in  this  way  he 
meets  at  the  corner  of  a  path  the  idea,  which  was 
wandering  along,  he  looks  at  it,  finds  it  fair,  noble, 
chaste,  he  falls  in  love  with  it  in  a  second,  gets  excited, 
warm,  eloquent,  and  passionate  ;  he  becomes  serious, 
eloquent,  and  convinced  ;  he  defends  with  lyrical,  hon- 
est indignation,  beauty,  goodness,  truth,  that  moral 
trinity,  which  counts  to-day  nearly  as  many  unbelievers 
as  the  theological  Trinity.  He  is  a  sage,  a  philoso- 
pher, almost  a  preacher.  And  the  forgotten  play  ?  He 
remembers  it  somewhat  late,  when  he  finds  that  he  has 
got  to  the  end  of  the  tenth  column  of  his  article  and 
that  presently  the  portico  will  be  completed  ;  so  in  a 
few  sharp,  quick,  telling  words  he  gives  the  subject  of 
the  drama  or  the  comedy,  he  states  its  defects  and  its 
qualities,  approves  or  disapproves  its  tendencies  with 
that  common-sense  of  his  which  is  scarcely  ever  mis- 
taken, in  his  feeling  for  the  stage  transformed  by  years 
into  infallible  experience.  He  has  even  had  time  to 
review  the  actors,  to  flatter  or  scold  them,  or  at  least 

213 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

to  call  them  by  their  names  like  a  general  who  rides 
down  the  line  of  battle.  So  "the  prince  of  the 
critics"  was  at  that  time  and  is  still  a  current  expres- 
sion understood  by  every  one  as  meaning  Jules  Janin, 
just  as  u  our  most  fertile  novelist "  means  Balzac. 

You  will  readily  believe  that  a  style  with  so  charac- 
teristic a  swing,  so  peculiar  a  savour,  so  marked  a 
manner,  was  frequently  imitated  —  but  no  one  imitated 
it  so  well  as  Janin  himself. 

I  have  dwelt  on  the  new  academician's  talent  as  a 
writer  of  newspaper  articles ;  it  is  that  side  of  him 
which  the  public  knows  most  of  and  that  in  which  he 
shows  himself  oftenest  at  that  Monday  balcony  whence 
the  writer  bows  to  his  readers ;  but  J.  J.  (who  now 
becomes  Jules  Janin  in  full  and  will  hereafter  add  the 
regulation  words  "  of  the  French  Academy")  has 
written  quite  a  number  of  very  good  books  :  "  The 
Dead  Ass  and  the  Beheaded  Wife,"  —  one  of  those 
youthful  sins  which  a  man  ought  not  to  disavow  later 
under  pretext  of  wisdom  and  taste,  for  it  is  these  which 
make  you  known  and  make  you  famous ;  "  Barnave," 
in  which  there  are  so  many  splendid  passages ;  "  The 
Pedestal,"  a  bold  subject  brilliantly  carried  out ; 
"  Clarissa  Harlowe^"  drawn  from  her  dull  setting  and 

214 


JULES    JANIN 


restored  with  pious  care  ;  "  The  End  of  a  World," 
which  is  the  continuation  and  the  conclusion  of 
"Rameau's  Nephew";  "The  Nun  of  Toulouse," 
and  many  other  books  well  written  and  well  printed, 
worthy  in  every  respect  to  be  placed  in  the  Passy 
chalet  on  the  shelves  of  the  select  library  by  the  side  of 
the  princeps  editions  of  the  great  authors  splendidly 
bound  by  Bauzonnet,  Capet,  Petit,  and  the  other 
masters  of  the  art,  the  pride  and  happiness  of  the 
scholar  who  lives  in  the  midst  of  these  riches,  which 
he  is  not  satisfied  with  looking  at,  but  which  he  reads, 
studies,  and  the  very  marrow  of  which  he  assimilates. 

That  is  readily  seen  in  his  style. 

Janin's  speech  on  the  great  writer  (Sainte-Beuve) 
whose  place  he  took  in  the  Academy  has  been  pub- 
lished by  the  papers,  and  the  dramatic  critic  did  full 
justice  to  the  critic  of  books.  He  told  us  of  his 
marvellous  success,  of  his  depth  of  intuition,  of  his 
subtlety,  of  his  patience  as  an  investigator,  of  his  gift 
of  understanding  everything,  feeling  everything,  of 
entering  into  the  most  opposite  natures,  living  their 
life,  thinking  their  thoughts,  descending  into  their 
most  secret  parts,  a  golden  lamp  in  his  hand,  and  of 
passing  like  the  Hindoo  gods  through  a  perpetual 

215 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

series  of  incarnations  and  avatars.  He  suitably  lauded 
that  curiosity  constantly  awake,  never  satisfied,  which 
thought  it  knew  nothing  if  it  had  allowed  the  least 
detail  to  escape.  Homo  duplex^  man  is  double,  said 
the  philosopher.  As  far  as  Sainte-Beuve  is  concerned, 
he  is  even  triple,  and  desiring  to  complete  the  portrait 
which  all  believed  to  be  finished,  he  asked  for  new 
sittings  from  the  model,  sought  more  information, 
ferreted  out,  found  out,  and  only  passed  to  another 
when  the  resemblance  of  the  picture  placed  upon  the 
easel  left  nothing  more  to  be  desired. 

Certainly,  if  anything  from  this  world  reaches  the 
other,  Sainte-Beuve  must  have  been  happy  at  hearing 
himself  praised  thus.  Perhaps  he  may  have  thought 
that  because  the  critic  was  so  highly  lauded,  the  poet 
was  somewhat  too  lightly  spoken  of.  That  was  his 
only  and  secret  self-love ;  —  Sainte-Beuve  almost  re- 
;  gretted  that  his  second  reputation,  so  vast,  so  deserved, 
so  universally  accepted,  should  have  masked,  as  it 
were,  or  eclipsed  the  first.  "  The  poet,  who  died  young 
while  the  man  survived,"  still  existed  for  him,  ever 
young  and  living,  and  he  loved  people  to  allude  to 
him  and  to  ask  for  him ;  it  was  with  real  pleasure  that 
he  recited  to  his  intimate  friends,  without  much  press- 

216 


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JULES   JANIN 

ing,  some  fragments  of  a  mysterious  elegy,  some 
languorous  love  sonnet,  which  had  not  found  a  place 
in  one  of  his  three  volumes  of  verse.  A  word  or  two 
about  "  Joseph  Delorme,"  or  "  Consolations,"  and 
especially  "  Thoughts  in  August "  caused  him  greater 
joy  than  manifold  praise  of  his  last  u  Causerie  du 
lundi  "  ;  for  he  had  indeed  been  an  inventor  in  poetry,  ! 
he  had  struck  a  new  and  wholly  modern  note,  and  of 
all  his  set  he  was  assuredly  the  most  romantic.  In  the 
humble  poetry,  which  by  the  sincerity  of  feeling  and 
the  minuteness  of  detail  copied  from  nature  recalls 
the  verse  of  Crabbe,  Wordsworth  and  Cowper,  Sainte- 
Beuve  traced  out  for  himself  little  footpaths  half-way 
up  the  hill,  bordered  with  common  little  flowers,  where 
no  one  in  France  had  passed  before  him.  His  com- 
position is  somewhat  laborious  and  complex,  owing  to 
the  difficulty  he  experienced  in  reducing  to  metrical 
form  ideas  and  images  yet  unexpressed  or  hitherto  dis- 
dained. But  how  many  admirable,  inspired  passages,  in 
which  no  effort  is  felt !  What  intense,  subtle  charm  ! 
What  an  intimate  penetration  of  the  weariness  of  the 
soul !  What  a  divination  of  unconfessed  desires  and 
obscure  supplications !  Sainte-Beuve  as  a  poet  would 
easily  form  the  subject  of  a  long  and  interesting  study. 

217 


Portraits    of  the    Day 


TONY    JOHANNOT 

BORN  IN   1803  —  DIED  IN  1852 


ALTHOUGH   Tony   Johannot    was    a   news- 
paper man  through  his  illustrations,  he  did 
not  attract,  as  he  deserved  to  do,  the  atten- 
tion of  contemporary  critics,  because  newspapers  talk 
about     everything    except     newspaper     men.       Tony 
Johannot  sketched  his  articles  in  pencil  ;  that  was  the 
only  difference. 

The  admiration  felt  in  France  for  soporific  talents 
is  the  reason  why  until  now  justice  has  not  been  done 
to  him.  As  people  glance  at  one  of  his  numberless 
drawings,  they  remark,  "  It  is  very  pretty,"  and  pass 
on.  If  he  had  painted  some  huge  daub  full  of  wooden 
figures  on  cardboard  horses,  he  might  have  been  elected 
to  the  Institute  and  would  have  enjoyed  the  considera- 
tion which  takes  the  shape  of  crosses,  of  offices  and 
dignities.  Nothing  is  so  hurtful  to  a  man  as  grace, 
wit,  and  facility.  The  average  individual  who  sees  a 
clever  man  produce  rapidly  a  pretty  thing,  thinks  he 

218 


TONY    JOHANNOT 


has  been  done  out  of  his  money  ;  so  clever  men  shut 
themselves  up  in  their  den,  even  if  they  simply  intend 
to  go  to  sleep,  put  a  lighted  lamp  near  the  window, 
and  affirm  that  they  have  spent  three  months  in  pro- 
ducing a  work  which  they  really  dashed  off  in  three 
days.  Tony  Johannot  had  to  bear  the  consequences 
of  having  published  in  the  course  of  fifteen  years, 
without  making  any  fuss  and  merely  when  asked  by 
publishers,  a  vast  number  of  delightful  sketches  which, 
though  they  were  dashed  off,  were  none  the  less 
finished  work  and  which  many  painters  of  great  pre- 
tensions would  have  found  it  difficult  to  equal.  This 
enormous  quantity  of  work,  scattered  in  more  than  a 
thousand  volumes,  can  sustain  comparison  with  the 
works  of  Cochin,  Gravelot,  Eisen,  Moreau,  Saint-Non, 
and  the  cleverest  sketchers  of  previous  centuries. 

At  all  times  books  have  been  more  or  less  richly 
illustrated.  The  illuminators  and  miniaturists  of  the 
Middle  Ages  covered  the  margins  of  missals  and 
romances  of  chivalry  with  marvellous  arabesques  in 
which  fantastic  birds  mingled  with  ideal  flowers  in  a 
maze  of  curves  fit  to  drive  the  most  patient  copyist  to 
despair.  The  capital  letters  formed  frames  for  small 
episodical  scenes,  and  in  the  most  important  places 

219 


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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

were  inserted  vignettes  in  which  ultramarine  and  gold 
rival  each  other  in  brilliancy  and  beauty.  Printing 
was  the  death  of  caligraphy,  engraving  suppressed  the 
illuminator  and  miniaturist,  but  the  custom  of  illus- 
trating valuable  books  and  of  translating  a  page  into  a 
drawing  remained. 

This  kind  of  work,  in  which  the  pencil  intensifies 
the  stroke  of  the  pen,  calls  for  a  particular  kind  of 
talent.  The  artist  must  understand  the  poet,  and  be 
himself,  so  to  speak,  a  literary  man.  It  is  not  a  ques- 
tion of  transferring  nature  directly  to  the  canvas,  of 
copying  reality  as  it  is  seen,  —  for  in  art  there  are  in- 
numerable forms  of  reality,  —  of  seizing  the  play  of 
light  and  shade,  of  reproducing  the  attitude  of  the 
head  which  you  like,  of  the  smile  which  charms  you; 
that  is  the  painter's  business.  The  book  illustrator  — 
we  may  be  allowed  this  neologism,  which  has  almost 
ceased  to  be  one  —  must  see  only  with  another's  eyes. 
He  loves  dark  women  with  arched  eyebrows,  blue- 
black  hair,  clean,  Syracusan  profiles ;  his  author's  hero- 
ine is  a  regular  German  moonbeam,  showing  silvery 
amid  falling  hair.  He  has  never  seen  the  luxurious 
vegetation  of  the  tropics,  the  palms,  the  rose-apples, 
the  frangipanes,  though  he  knows  thoroughly  the  hedges 

220 


TONY    JOHANNOT 


of  hawthorn,  the  brooks  purling  under  the  water  cress, 
the  hut  hidden  between  the  walnut  trees  —  but  it  is 
"  Paul  and  Virginia  "  which  he  has  to  illustrate  ;  never 
mind,  he  will  make  a  masterpiece  of  it. 

Like  the  newspaper  man,  the  illustrator  must  always 
be  ready  for  anything.  Which  of  us  knows  what  he 
will  write  about  to-morrow  ?  In  one  and  the  same 
article,  chance  may  take  us  from  Russia  to  Egypt, 
from  the  hoariest  antiquity  to  the  most  living  actuality  ; 
every  minute  we  have  to  overleap  two  thousand  years 
or  two  thousand  leagues  ;  every  period,  every  country, 
every  style  must  be  known.  That  is  a  difficulty  which 
is  not  thought  of  and  which  is  tremendous.  To  accept 
a  subject  or  to  choose  it  for  yourself  are  two  very 
different  things.  Much  adaptability,  much  intelligence, 
much  readiness  of  mind,  much  quickness  of  hand  are 
needed  for  such  difficult  work.  Tony  Johannot  is  un- 
questionably the  prince  of  illustrators.  Some  years  ago 
no  novel  or  poem  could  be  published  without  a  wood- 
cut signed  with  his  name.  How  many  slim-waisted, 
swan-necked,  long-locked,  small-footed  heroines  he  has 
drawn  on  Japan  paper  !  How  many  a  ragged  tramp, 
how  many  a  knight  armed  cap-a-pie,  how  many  a 
scaly,  many-clawed  monster  he  has  scattered  upon  the 

221 


££  ********  4,4.4:^:^4,4:4.4:4:  4.££.k 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

yellow  covers  of  mediaeval  novels  !  He  has  handled 
all  the  verse  and  all  the  literature  of  ancient  and  mod- 
ern times  :  the  Bible,  Moliere,  Cervantes,  Walter  Scott, 
Byron,  Bernardin  de  Saint-Pierre,  Goethe,  Chateau- 
briand, Lamartine,  Victor  Hugo,  —  he  has  treated 
every  one  of  them.  His  drawings  appeared  in  these 
wondrous  books  and  no  one  thought  them  out  of  place. 
By  the  side  of  these  sublime  pages,  of  these  harmonious 
verses,  they  formed  an  ornament  and  not  a  blot.  What 
so  many  different  geniuses  dreamed,  he  succeeded  in 
rendering  and  transporting  it  into  his  own  art.  Assur- 
edly that  is  a  glory  worth  many  another,  to  have  put  his 
name  into  all  these  books,  the  honour  of  humankind. 
Ary  Scheffer,  though  he  never  made  any  vignettes,  may 
be  considered  as  the  type  of  the  literary  artist,  whose 
genius  is  excited  by  the  art  of  a  poem.  What  are 
"  Marguerite  Spinning,"  "  Marguerite  at  Church," 
the  two  "  Mignons,"  "  Medora,"  "  The  Giaour," 
«The  King  of  Thule,"  « Eberhard  the  Weeper," 
but  splendid  illustrations  ?  If  Scheffer  had  met  the 
real  Marguerite  in  the  street,  he  would  doubtless  have 
been  less  struck  with  her  than  with  Goethe's  Marguerite 
whom  he  met  in  a  scene  in  u  Faust."  Highly  de- 
veloped civilisation,  the  fusion  of  the  various  arts,  the 

222 


TONY    JOHANNOT 


habit  of  living  among  the  creations  of  the  mind,  have 
the  effect  on  certain  peculiar  minds  of  making  them  see 
nature  at  last  only  through  the  masterpieces  of  men. 

No  doubt  thorough-bred  painters,  who  need  but  a 
contour  to  excite  them  and  who  discover  a  painting  in 
an  attitude,  in  the  fall  of  a  fold,  are  to  be  preferred; 
but  there  is  to  me  a  wondrous  charm  in  these  delicate 
flowers  which  have  bloomed  in  the  hot-house  of  another 
art.  Their  tints  are  of  a  lovely  pallor,  they  have  soft 
shades  penetrated,  as  it  were,  by  a  mysterious  light  ; 
under  the  colours  of  the  painter,  you  hear  the  murmur 
of  the  poet's  strophes.  These  hybrid  creations  have  a 
peculiar  attraction  for  refined  minds. 

What  Ary  Scheffer  realised  in  a  sphere  serene  and 
apart,  Tony  Johannot  accomplished  within  the  condi- 
tions of  modern  industry  which  constantly  —  and  that 
is  the  greatest  praise  which  can  be  given  it  —  has  need 
of  the  arts  ;  and  he  did  it  amid  all  the  tumult  and  all 
the  chances  of  publication.  He  despised  nothing,  not 
even  the  heading  of  a  page,  an  ornamental  letter,  or 
a  poster  ;  he  lent  his  swift,  clever  pencil,  his  com- 
positions, ever  intelligent  and  fine,  to  all  men,  poets, 
historians,  novelists,  or  writers  of  picturesque  works. 

One  needs  to  know,  as  I  do,  how  little  is  left  of  a 

223 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

drawing  engraved  on  wood,  then  electrotyped  and 
printed  with  thick  ink,  to  admire  Johannot  as  he  de- 
serves to  be  admired.  The  engraver  merits,  as  much 
as  the  translator,  the  epithet  tradlttore. 

Weary  of  seeing  his  delicate  work  made  heavy  by 
coarse  or  careless  engravers,  Tony  Johannot  ended  in 
refusing  to  trust  any  one  but  himself.  He  remembered 
that  he  also  had  once  handled  the  graver,  and  turning 
to  account  the  publication  of  a  beautiful  work  which  a 
publisher  of  taste  desired  to  bring  out,  he  himself 
etched  a  series  of  exquisite  illustrations  for  Goethe's 
"  Werther,"  translated  by  Pierre  Leroux  and  with  a 
preface  by  George  Sand. 

Tony  Johannot,  the  improvising  artist,  supplies  with 
Gavarni  the  illustrations  called  for  by  Paris.  Only, 
there  is  between  Tony  Johannot  and  Gavarni  this 
difference,  that  the  former  does  his  best  work  in  books, 
while  Gavarni  prefers  to  choose  his  own  subject. 
Gavarni' s  types  belong  to  him  more  completely,  but  he 
lacks  Johannot's  skill  in  translating  the  thought  of 
others.  Johannot  is  more  of  a  poet,  Gavarni  more  of 
a  philosopher ;  the  one  understands  and  the  other  sees ; 
but  those  two,  such  as  they  are,  have  no  rivals  in  the 
art  which  they  follow. 

224 


Portraits  of  the   D  ay 


INGRES 

BORN  IN  1781  —  DIED  IN  1867 


AN  artist's  life  is  in  his  work,  especially  nowa- 
days when  the  development  of  civilisation 
has  diminished  the  number  of  eventful  lives 
and  almost  destroyed  the  chance  of  personal  adventure. 
The  biographies  of  most  of  the  great  masters  of  past  ages 
contain  a  legend,  a  romance,  or,  at  all  events,  a  story. 
Those  of  the  famous  painters  and  sculptors  of  our  day 
may  be  summed  up  in  a  few  lines  :  struggle  in  obscurity, 
work  in  shadow,  suffering  bravely  borne,  a  reputation 
denied  at  first,  later  acknowledged,  recompensed  more 
or  less  sufficiently,  great  orders,  the  cross  of  the  Legion 
of  Honour,  election  to  the  Institute.  Aside  from  a  few 
victims  who  fall  before  the  hour  of  triumph  and  who 
are  ever  to  be  regretted,  such  is,  save  for  a  small  num- 
ber of  special  details,  the  usual  substance  of  modern 
biographies.  But  if  facts  have  small  place  in  them,  on 
the  other  hand,  ideas  and  characters  take  up  much  room; 
the  works  make  up  for  the  incidents  which  are  lacking. 

15  225 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

Jean-Auguste-Dominique  Ingres  was  born  at  Mon- 
tauban  in  1781,  so  he  is  seventy-six  to-day.  Never 
was  there  a  greener  old  age  or  one  that  weighed  less 
upon  the  man,  and  we  may  safely  venture  to  promise 
that  the  illustrious  master  will  live  as  long  as  Titian 
and  even  longer. 

There  is  a  portrait  of  Ingres  painted  by  himself,  in 
1804.  He  has  represented  himself  standing  in  front 
of  his  easel  with  the  end  of  his  cloak  thrown  over  his 
shoulder.  In  his  right  hand  he  holds  a  white  pencil, 
his  left  rests  on  his  breast ;  the  head,  in  three  quarters, 
faces  you.  The  painter  seems  to  be  calling  up  his 
faith  and  his  will  before  beginning  his  work.  The 
features,  in  spite  of  their  youth  (the  artist  was  then 
twenty-four),  are  strongly  marked.  The  hair,  of  a 
deep  black,  is  parted  on  the  brow  and  curls  freely  and 
strongly  ;  the  brown  eyes  are  of  an  almost  wild  bril- 
liancy, the  lips  are  a  rich  red,  and  the  complexion, 
tanned  by  internal  fires,  recalls  the  amber,  tawny  tone 
which  Giorgione  was  so  fond  of;  the  turned-down 
shirt-collar  sets  off  by  its  broad  white  tint  the  warm 
flesh  tones.  The  background  is  of  that  neutral  tone 
with  which  studio  walls  are  painted. 

The  portrait  shows  remarkable  virility ;  it  is  full  of 

226 


******************:!>***** 

INGRES 

the  vigorous  life  of  youth,  held  in  by  the  will.  The 
master  shows  behind  the  student.  Those  who  accuse 
Ingres  of  being  cold  have  certainly  not  seen  that  quick, 
strong,  determined  face  which  seems  to  follow  you 
with  its  dark,  steady,  deep  glance.  It  is  one  of  those 
troublesome  portraits  with  which  you  can  never  be 
alone  in  the  room  where  they  hang,  for  a  soul  watches 
you  through  the  dark  eyes. 

I  am  very  fond  of  looking  at  the  portraits  of  illustri- 
ous masters  painted  at  the  outset  of  their  career,  before 
glory  has  settled  upon  their  dreamy  brow.  Such  por- 
traits are  rare.  It  is  not  until  men  have  grown  older 
and  become  famous  that  people  bethink  themselves  of 
multiplying  their  likeness. 

The  artist  has  fulfilled  every  promise  held  out  by 
this  particular  portrait,  —  ardent  faith,  undaunted  cour- 
age, invincible  perseverance.  In  the  clean  lines,  in 
the  strongly  marked  flats,  in  the  strong  build  of  the 
man  shows  an  obstinate  genius  which  may  even  be 
called  hard-headed.  Has  it  not  been  said  that  genius; 
is  infinite  patience  ?  The  motto  of  such  a  man  seems 
to  be,  Etiam  si  omnes  ego  non ;  and  in  truth  nothing, 
neither  classical  pedantry  nor  Romanticist  riotousness, 
have  succeeded  in  turning  away  from  the  worship  of 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

pure  beauty  that  enthusiastic  artist,  who  was  so  long  a 
solitary,  who  preferred  to  await  reputation  rather  than 
acquire  it  hastily  by  conforming  to  popular  ideas. 
At  a  time  when  men  doubted,  hesitated,  idled,  he 
proved  to  be  a  believer  who  never  wavered  for  a 
second.  Nature,  Phidias,  and  Raphael  were  to  him  a 
sort  of  trinity  of  art,  the  Ideal  of  which  was  the  unity. 
If  a  monk's  cowl  replaced  the  cloak,  the  painting 
would  show  a  young  Italian  monk  of  the  Middle  Ages, 
one  of  those  who  became  cardinals  or  popes ;  for  they 
possessed  the  power  of  following  out  a  single  idea  their 
life  long. 

Now  let  us  look  at  the  portrait  of  the  great  master 
full  of  years  and  honours,  who  reigned  despotically 
over  a  school  of  enthusiastic  followers,  worshipped 
and  feared  like  a  god.  The  hair,  which  as  yet  shows 
but  a  slight  touch  of  white,  is  still  parted  in  the  centre 
in  honour  of  the  divine  Sanzio,  a  sort  of  mysterious 
token  by  which  the  devotee  consecrates  himself  to  his 
ideal.  A  few  wrinkles  have  slightly  furrowed  the 
brow,  a  few  veins  show  upon  the  broader  temples ; 
compact,  solid  flesh  broadens  the  original  form  and 
marks  strongly  the  outlines  shown  in  the  earlier 
portrait.  The  mouth  is  sadder-looking,  with  two  or 

228 


INGRES 


three  morose  wrinkles  at  the  corners,  but  the  eye 
preserves  its  immortal  youth  and  still  gazes  upon  the 
same  end,  the  Beautiful.  Instead  of  the  modern  over- 
coat, place  on  that  figure  a  Roman  mantle,  and  the 
head,  with  its  strong  lines,  and  its  vigorous  colour 
modified,  not  destroyed  by  age,  could  figure  among 
the  Roman  prelates  assembled  in  conclave,  or  in  a 
ceremony  in  the  Sistine  Chapel.  If  I  insist  upon 
this  point,  it  is  because  the  worship  of  art,  of  which 
he  was  the  most  fervent  priest,  imparted  to  Ingres 
a  positively  pontifical  aspect.  During  his  whole  life 
he  carried  the  sacred  Ark  and  bore  the  tables  of 
the  Law. 

The  biographies  of  artists  begin  usually  with  a  nar- 
ration of  the  obstacles  placed  in  the  way  of  an  un- 
doubted vocation  by  the  members  of  the  family.  The 
father,  who  wants  his  son  to  be  a  notary,  a  doctor, 
or  a  barrister,  burns  the  poems,  tears  up  the  drawings, 
hides  the  brushes.  In  Ingres'  case,  wonderful  to  re- 
late, there  were  no  difficulties  of  this  sort.  The  son's 
intentions  agreed  with  the  father's  wishes;  the  child 
was  given  paper,  red  pencils,  and  a  portfolio  of  engrav- 
ings to  copy;  he  also  learned  music  on  the  violin. 
Painter  or  musician,  whichever  it  might  be,  such  a 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

career  in  no  wise  terrified  his  excellent  father.  The 
phenomenon  is  explained  by  the  fact  that  the  latter 
was  himself  a  musician  and  a  painter.  Young  Ingres 
was  sent  to  the  studio  of  M.  Roque,  of  Toulouse,  a 
pupil  of  Vien ;  but  the  thing  which  decided  his  fate 
was  the  sight  of  a  copy  of  the  u  Madonna  della  Sedia  " 
brought  from  Italy,  rather  than  his  master's  teach- 
ing. The  impression  this  picture  made  on  him  was 
ineffaceable ;  even  now,  when  he  is  over  sixty,  it  still 
rules  his  life. 

A  few  years  later  he  came  to  Paris  and  entered 
David's  studio.  He  obtained  at  the  competition  a 
second  prize,  which  exempted  him  from  conscription. 
In  1 80 1  he  took  the  first  prize  for  his  painting, 
"  Achilles  receiving  in  his  tent  the  deputies  of  Aga- 
memnon," which  is  now  to  be  seen  at  the  Academy 
of  Fine  Arts,  and  which  is  already  characteristic  of 
him.  Although  a  laureate,  he  did  not  at  once  leave 
for  the  Eternal  City,  which  was  to  become  his  second 
country.  The  finances  of  the  State  were  exhausted, 
and  there  were  no  funds  to  pay  bursaries,  so  he 
waited  for  a  more  fortunate  time,  working  and 
drawing  from  the  antique  and  the  model  in  the 
Museum  and  at  Susse's  studio,  copying  engravings 

230 


INGRES 


of  the  great  masters,  and  preparing  himself  for  coming 
glory,  by  hard,  serious  study. 

At  last  he  got  to  Rome,  to  the  city  in  which  before 
him  another  austere  master,  Poussin,  had  become  so 
thoroughly  naturalised  that  he  almost  forgot  France 
amidst  the  masterpieces  of  antiquity.  The  artistic 
atmosphere,  so  favourable  to  quiet  and  thoughtful 
work,  suited  him  admirably;  he  grew  stronger  in 
silence,  in  solitude,  far  from  coteries  and  sets,  and 
turned  his  studio  into  a  sort  of  cloister  which  the 
rumour  of  the  world  never  reached.  He  lived  alone, 
proud  and  sad  ;  but  every  day  he  could  admire  the 
Loggle  and  the  Stanze  of  Raphael,  and  that  consoled 
him  for  many  things.  Soon  after,  he  married  the 
woman  who  had  been  sent  to  him  from  France,  and 
who,  by  providential  good  fortune,  turned  out  to  be 
exactly  the  one  whom  he  would  have  chosen  for  him- 
self. Every  one  knows  with  what  tireless  devotion 
Madame  Ingres  kept  from  her  husband  all  those  little 
troubles  which  wear  and  distract  genius.  She  con- 
cealed from  him  the  painful  side  of  life,  and  created 
around  him  an  atmosphere  of  calm  and  serenity,  even 
when  times  were  hardest.  Sure  of  attaining  his  end 
sooner  or  later,  although  he  saw  his  work  disregarded 

231 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

or  little  esteemed,  Ingres  persisted  in  following  the 
path  upon  which  he  had  started,  and  often  want  made 
itself  felt  within  his  household.  Such  poverty  is  glori- 
ous and  may  well  be  spoken  of.  At  Florence  the  art- 
ist, whose  work  is  now  worth  its  weight  in  gold,  was 
obliged  to  paint  portraits  for  the  meanest  price  in  order 
to  defray  household  expenses,  and  he  did  not  even  al- 
ways have  portraits  to  paint.  Never  did  an  artist 
carry  farther  contempt  for  money  and  easily  acquired 
reputation. 

He  laboured  a  long  time  over  his  paintings,  and 
knew  how  to  await  the  moment  of  inspiration  of  works 
which  were  to  last  forever.  The  public  is  inclined  to 
believe  that  the  painter  of  the  "  Vow  of  Louis  XIII," 
of  the  Homer  ceiling  and  of  the  "  Stratonice,"  is  not  a 
rapid  worker.  That  is  a  mistake.  The  painter  is  so 
thoroughly  trained  and  so  sure  of  himself  that  he  never 
puts  on  a  touch  of  colour  which  does  not  tell,  and  often 
Ingres  has  painted  in  a  single  day  a  great  figure  from 
head  to  foot  in  which  no  one  else  than  he  could  detect 
a  defect.  But  an  artist  so  conscientious  and  so  strong 
is  not  easily  satisfied  ;  what  is  well  is  not  sufficient,  he 
wants  the  best,  and  only  stops  at  the  point  where  the 
imperfection  of  human  means  stops  geniuses  which  are 

232 


************************ 

INGRES 

most  trained  to  pursue  the  ideal.  So  paintings  which 
he  began  at  the  outset  of  his  career  have  only  recently 
been  finished,  but  those  who  have  been  fortunate 
enough  to  see  them  do  not  think  the  artist  took  too 
long  to  complete  them,  although  they  have  been  some 
forty  years  on  the  easel. 

"  The  Odalisque,"  for  which  Queen  Caroline  of 
Naples  gave  him  a  commission  in  1813  and  which 
was  purchased  by  M.  Pourtales  in  1816  for  the  orna- 
ment of  his  gallery  —  it  now  belongs  to  M.  Goupil, 
who  was  determined  that  the  masterpiece  should  not 
leave  France  —  was  the  first  picture  which  drew  atten- 
tion to  the  master,  who  was  yet  unknown  in  his  own 
country.  The  effect  it  produced  might  have  discour- 
aged a  man  of  less  sturdy  convictions.  His  exquisite 
perfection  of  drawing,  his  admirable  and  delicate  model- 
ing, the  splendid  taste  which  united  the  choicest  of 
nature  to  the  purest  traditions  of  antiquity,  were  not 
then  appreciated.  "  The  Odalisque "  was  called 
Gothic,  and  the  painter  was  accused  of  seeking  to  go 
back  to  the  dawn  of  art.  This  strange  judgment  is  no 
invention  of  mine.  The  barbarians  whom  his  critics 
of  1817  said  Ingres  was  supposed  to  be  imitating  were 
merely  Andrea  Mantegna,  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  Perugino, 

233 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

Raphael,  —  people  who,  as  of  course  every  one  knows, 
have  long  since  been  left  behind  by  progress.  Later 
on  the  Romanticists  also  were  reproached  with  making 
the  French  language  go  back  to  Ronsard. 

"The  Vow  of  Louis  XIII,"  on  which  Ingres 
worked  for  three  years,  at  last  compelled  admiration. 
Never,  indeed,  since  the  days  of  the  painter  of  Urbino 
had  a  nobler,  a  more  splendid  Madonna  presented  a 
more  divine  Child  Jesus  to  the  worship  of  angels  and 
of  men.  The  French  artist  had  taken  rank,  by  that 
masterpiece,  among  the  great  Italian  masters  of  the 
sixteenth  century.  The  angels  drawing  up  the  cur- 
tains, the  children  bearing  tablets,  the  King's  figure 
seen  from  the  back  and  showing  merely  a  slight  pro- 
file above  a  great  fleur-de-lised  mantle,  the  folds  of 
which  spread  out  over  the  slabs  of  the  pavement, 
were  painted  in  a  style  and  with  a  power  the  tra- 
ditions of  which  had  been  lost  for  more  than  two 
centuries. 

In  1824  Ingres  received  the  cross  of  the  Legion  of 
Honour,  and  in  1825  he  was  elected  to  the  Institute 
of  France.  The  "Apotheosis  of  Homer,"  in  the 
Salon  of  1827,  at  which  were  exhibited  also  Eugene 
Deveria's  "  Birth  of  Henry  IV,"  and  Eugene  Dela- 

234 


************************ 

INGRES 

croix'  "  Sardanapalus,"  crowned  the  glory  of  the 
artist  who  had  been  so  long  misunderstood.  He  thus 
gained  for  himself  in  a  serene  region  far  above  the 
squabbles  of  schools,  a  position  apart,  which  he  has 
kept  ever  since  and  which  no  one  has  attempted  to 
take  from  him.  He  maintains  himself  in  it  with  ma- 
jestic tranquillity, — pacem  summa  tenent^  — hearing  only 
the  vague  rumours  of  the  distant  world  and  cultivating 
the  beautiful  without  any  distraction ;  a  stranger  to  his 
time,  but  living  with  Phidias  and  Raphael  that  eternal 
life  of  art  which  is  true  life,  since  often  but  a  poem, 
a  statue,  a  painting  remains  of  a  whole  vanished 
nation. 

Curiously  enough,  this  austere  master  was  supported 
by  the  Romanticists,  and  he  counted  more  enthusiastic 
partisans  among  the  members  of  the  new  school  than 
in  the  Academy.  Although  Ingres  might,  to  a  super- 
ficial observer,  appear  to  be  a  classical  painter,  he  is 
not  in  the  least  so ;  he  goes  back  straight  to  primitive 
sources,  to  Greek  antiquity,  to  the  sixteenth  century ; 
no  one  more  faithfully  observes  local  colour  than  he 
does.  His  "  Entry  of  Charles  V  into  Paris  "  is  like  a 
Gothic  tapestry  ;  his  "  Francesca  da  Rimini "  seems  to 
have  been  taken  from  one  of  those  precious  illumin- 

235 


tfcttrdbt^tw^u^tJc*  db  tbti?  ~tl?  tS?  sfc  djttJttrtlbti!  !§?!«?  si?  si? 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

ated  manuscripts  which  called  for  all  the  patience  of 
artists ;  his  "  Roger  and  Angelica  "  possesses  the  chiv- 
alrous grace  of  Ariosto's  poem  ;  his  u  Sistine  Chapel  " 
might  have  been  signed  by  Titian  ;  while  the  subjects 
he  has  drawn  from  antiquity,  such  as  "CEdipus," 
"  The  Apotheosis  of  Homer,"  the  "  Stratonice," 
"Venus  Anadyomene,"  seem  to  be  painted  in  exactly 
the  way  that  Appelles  would  have  painted  them.  His 
"  Odalisques "  would  excite  the  Sultan's  jealousy,  so 
familiar  does  the  artist  appear  to  be  with  the  secrets  of 
the  harem.  Nor  has  any  one  rendered  modern  life 
better  than  he  has,  as  witness  the  immortal  portrait 
of  M.  Bertin  de  Vaux,  which  seems  to  be  the  phy- 
siology of  a  character  and  the  history  of  a  reign. 
If  Ingres  knows  how  to  make  the  folds  of  Greek 
drapery  fall  admirably,  he  knows  equally  well  how 
to  turn  modern  dress  to  the  best  account,  and  how 
to  drape  a  shawl,  as  is  proved  by  his  portraits 
of  women. 

Whatever  may  be  the  subject  he  takes  up,  Ingres 
treats  it  with  the  same  rigorous  accuracy,  the  same 
extreme  fidelity  to  colour  and  form,  and  never  yields 
to  academic  mannerism ;  for  if  in  Cherubini's  histor- 
ical portrait  he  has  introduced  Polyhymnia  stretching 

236 


INGRES 


out  her  hand  over  the  artist's  inspired  brow,  he  has 
represented  the  old  master  in  his  wig  and  cloak  ;  and 
in  his  treatment  of  subjects  drawn  from  antiquity,  In- 
gres acts  exactly  like  a  poet  who,  desiring  to  write  a 
Greek  tragedy,  goes  back  to  ^Eschylus,  Euripides,  and 
Sophocles,  instead  of  imitating  Racine  and  his  disciples. 
In  this  sense  he  is  a  Romanticist  ;  hence  it  is  not  sur- 
prising that  he  gained  many  followers  among  the  new 
school,  although  for  the  public  in  general  any  man 
who  paints  scenes  from  ancient  history  and  mythology 
is  a  Classicist. 

The  "  Martyrdom  of  Saint  Symphorius,"  which 
would  have  been  admired  by  Michael  Angelo  and  Giu- 
lio  Romano,  was  not  fortunate  enough  to  please  the 
French  public  at  the  Exposition  of  1834.  The  sub- 
lime head  of  the  saint,  the  magnificent  gesture  of  the 
mother,  the  superb  attitudes  of  the  lictors,  were  not 
enough  to  make  the  colour,  with  its  mat,  sober,  strong 
likeness  to  the  tone  of  the  frescoes  of  the  great 
masters,  find  favour  in  the  eyes  of  the  sight-seers. 
The  artist,  rightly  indignant,  withdrew,  as  Achilles 
under  his  tent,  to  Rome,  where  he  became  director  of 
the  French  School,  and  he  gave  himself  up  to  the 
teaching  of  his  art  with  an  authority  which  no  other 

237 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

professor  could  equal.  His  pupils  adored  and  feared 
him,  and  every  day  there  occurred  in  the  school  vio- 
lent and  extraordinary  scenes,  quarrels,  and  reconcilia- 
tions. Ingres  speaks  of  his  art  with  singular  eloquence. 
Phidias  and  Raphael  excite  in  him  effusions  and  lyrical 
outbursts  which  should  be  taken  down  in  short-hand. 
On  other  occasions,  when  calmer,  he  enunciates  max- 
ims and  advice  which  it  is  always  well  to  follow,  and 
which  contain  the  whole  aesthetics  of  painting  com- 
pressed in  an  abrupt,  concise,  but  clear  way. 

His  influence  has  been  very  great  and  continues  to 
be  felt.  Hippolyte  Flandrin,  Amaury  Duval,  Leh- 
mann,  Ziegler,  Chasseriau  were  his  most  remarkable 
pupils,  but  each  one,  it  may  be  said,  did  honour  to  his 
master  within  the  bounds  of  his  own  talent. 

At  the  Universal  Exposition  of  1855,  Ingres'  works 
were  exhibited  in  a  separate  room,  a  sort  of  special 
chapel  of  that  great  jubilee  of  painting  to  which  the 
worshippers  of  the  beautiful  repaired  from  every  coun- 
try under  the  sun. 

The  limits  of  my  article  have  not  allowed  me  to 
write  of  the  whole  of  the  master's  work ;  I  preferred 
to  consider  the  artist  generally.  In  spite  of  some 
personal  peculiarities,  I  admire  his  whole  personality, 

238 


INGRES 


his  harmonious  life  dedicated  unreservedly  to  art,  his 
persistent  striving  after  the  beautiful,  which  nothing 
has  distracted.  Men  who  are  partisans  of  religious, 
political,  or  philosophical  systems,  will  no  doubt  affirm 
that  Ingres  does  not  serve  any  idea.  That  is  precisely 
wherein  lies  his  superiority.  Art  is  the  end,  and  not 
a  means  for  him,  and  never  was  there  a  higher  end. 
Every  poet,  sculptor,  or  painter  who  uses  his  pen, 
chisel,  or  brush  to  serve  any  system  whatever,  may 
be  more  or  less  of  a  statesman,  or  of  a  philosopher, 
but  I  should  greatly  mistrust  the  value  of  his  verse, 
of  his  statues,  of  his  paintings.  He  has  failed  to 
understand  that  beauty  is  superior  to  any  other  con- 
ception. Did  not  Plato  himself  say  that  "  Beauty  is 
the  splendour  of  truth  ?  " 

There  is  still  another  quality  which  could  be  joined 
to  all  the  others  which  Ingres  possessed  :  he  preserved 
the  secret,  now  lost,  of  reproducing  feminine  beauty. 
Look  at  the  "  Iliad  "  and  the  "  Odyssey,'*  at  "  An- 
gelica," "  The  Odalisque,"  the  "  Portrait  of  Mme.  de 
Vaucay,"  which  the  great  Leonardo  da  Vinci  would 
willingly  have  signed  ;  at  "  Cherubini's  Muse,"  the 
u  Venus  Anadyomene,"  the  "  Stratonice,"  the  figure 
of  Victory  in  "The  Apotheosis  of  Napoleon,"  and 

239 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

finally  "  The  Spring,"  a  genuine  Parian  marble  flushed 
with  life,  an  incredible  masterpiece,  a  marvel  of  grace 
and  of  bloom,  a  flower  of  Greek  springtime  which 
blossomed  under  the  artist's  brush  at  an  age  when  the 
palette  falls  from  the  sturdiest  hands. 


240 


Portraits   of  the   D  ay 


PAUL    DELAROCHE 

BORN  IN  1797  —  DIED  IN  i8|6 

IN  years  gone  by,  I  criticised  Paul  Delaroche 
rather  harshly.  It  was  in  the  days  when  con- 
troversies on  art  were  fought  out  to  the  bitter 
end  and  with  the  sharpest  weapons.  Happy  times 
they  were  !  Who  gets  excited  to-day  for  or  against 
a  poet,  a  painter,  or  a  composer  ?  The  splendid 
wrath  and  the  hot  admiration  of  bygone  years  are 
known  no  more.  I  hated  Paul  Delaroche,  whom  I 
had  never  seen,  with  a  savage  and  aesthetic  hatred ;  I 
could  have  eaten  him,  and  thought  him  good  eating,  as 
the  young  redskin  thought  the  Bishop  of  Quebec. 
What  was  the  cause  of  this  deep  aversion  ?  Delaroche 
in  painting,  as  Casimir  Delavigne  in  literature,  was 
hurting  and  turning  out  of  its  course,  by  prudent 
concessions,  by  timid  boldness,  by  a  sort  of  bourgeois 
Romanticism,  the  great  movement  directed  by  Victor 
Hugo  and  Eugene  Delacroix.  His  paintings,  com- 
posed like  the  endings  of  a  tragedy  and  executed  with 

1 6  241 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

extreme  finish,  drew  crowds.  He  indulged  in  a  co- 
quettish, polished,  lustrous  mediaevalism,  minutely  ac- 
curate in  trifles,  which  delighted  the  Philistines.  On 
all  hands  I  was  asked,  u  What  more  do  you  want  ? 
He  does  not  paint  Greeks  or  Romans."  But  I  had 
discovered  the  leg  of  Achilles  in  Cromwell's  jack-boot, 
and  the  torso  of  Hyacinth  under  the  surcoat  of  the 
Princes  in  the  Tower,  and  thereat  I  did  both  yell  and 
rage  !  I  wish  you  could  have  seen  me,  with  wild  hair 
and  all  my  claws  showing,  leaping  about  in  my  part  of 
the  newspaper  like  a  caged  wild  beast.  The  fanatics 
of  my  school,  the  wan,  the  tanned,  the  greenery-yallery, 
the  long-haired,  the  fiercely  moustached,  the  heavily 
bearded,  those  who  wore  ruffles  and  jerkins,  called 
out,  "Well  roared,  lion." 

Many  years  have  since  gone  by.  As  I  recall  these 
things  and  smile  at  the  sacred  fury  of  my  youth,  I  do 
not  in  any  respect  regret  it.  Pure  thought  inspired 
me,  boundless  love  of  art  impelled  me,  and  the  danger 
which  I  pointed  out  was  in  no  wise  chimerical.  I 
was  wrong,  no  doubt,  in  the  form  of  my  attack,  but 
at  bottom  I  was  right.  My  task  was  a  noble  one;  I 
was  pleading  the  cause  of  ignored  genius  against  popu- 
lar talent,  and  fanatical,  like  every  believer,  I  tried  to 

242 


PAUL    DELAROCHE 

shatter  the  idol  of  the  crowd  in  order  to  erect  upon  its 
pedestal  the  statue  of  the  true  god. 

Since  then,  while  remaining  true  to  my  beliefs,  I 
have  come  to  recognise  the  ingenious  mind,  the  patient 
study,  and  the  unswerving  perseverance  of  the  artist ;  I 
have  admired,  as  every  one  has,  and  more  than  any 
one  has,  that  marvellous  little  masterpiece,  "The 
Death  of  the  Duke  of  Guise,"  an  amazingly  faithful 
historical  painting,  a  photographic  reproduction  of  a 
period  made  centuries  later,  a  retrospective  picture 
which  might  well  be  the  work  of  an  eye-witness. 

Although  Paul  Delaroche  enjoyed  a  reputation 
more  than  European,  and  which  might,  without  exag- 
geration be  called  world-wide,  it  is  not  a  paradox  to 
affirm  that  he  is  little  known.  Among  the  members 
of  the  present  generation,  there  are  few  who  have  seen 
paintings  by  him.  Popular  though  he  was,  thanks  to 
the  splendid  engravings  published  by  Goupil,  who  had 
for  him  a  sort  of  worship,  he  avoided  the  noisy  arena 
of  the  Salon ;  he  even  kept  away  from  the  great  Ex- 
position of  1855,  to  which  French  and  foreign  masters 
sent  their  finest  paintings. 

The  exhibition  of  his  works  in  the  Palace  of  the 
Fine  Arts,  was  almost  a  complete  novelty  to  most  of 

243 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

the  visitors,  to  whom  the  recent  works  of  the  painter 
are  assuredly  unknown,  even  supposing  they  have  seen 
and  recall  his  former  ones. 

I  approve  of  these  solemn  exhibitions,  in  which  the 
dead  artist,  before  he  passes  definitely  to  posterity, 
shows  frankly  and  simply  his  work  from  his  earliest 
lisp  in  art  to  his  final  word.  So  what  I  have  to  do 
now  is  to  pass  a  serious  judgment  which  shall  con- 
ciliate the  respect  due  to  an  illustrious  memory  with 
the  severity  obligatory  in  matters  affecting  the  pres- 
ent and  the  future  of  art.  I  am  far  from  desiring 
to  diminish  the  reputation  of  one  of  the  glories  of 
France,  and  yet  it  is  well  not  to  yield  to  an  easily 
understood  admiration,  and  in  the  name  of  high  art  to 
make  some  reservations,  to  state  some  objections 
against  tendencies  which  ought  not  to  be  encouraged. 

Paul  Delaroche  was  not  born  a  painter.  He  did 
not  possess  the  gift,  as  did  the  masters  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  to  say  nothing  of  some  of  our  own  contempo- 
raries ;  art  is  not  in  him  a  native  flower  which  blooms 
spontaneously  in  the  springtime  of  life,  and  crowns  the 
brow  of  Raphael ;  Delaroche  did  not  produce,  when 
quite  young  and  almost  unconsciously,  masterpieces 
which  he  found  it  difficult  to  surpass  in  mature  age, 

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PAUL    DELAROCHE 

even  if  he  managed  to  equal  them.  He  had  not 
the  innate  feeling  for  form,  still  less  the  feeling  for 
colour,  or  that  imperious  temperament  of  the  painter, 
which  betrays  itself  in  the  first  daubs  of  the  child.  But 
he  possessed  in  a  high  degree  intelligence  and  will  ;  he 
bent  all  the  persistent  qualities  of  his  mind  to  the  at- 
tainment of  a  determinate  end  ;  he  worked,  he  cor- 
rected, he  improved,  and  he  stopped  only  at  his  extreme 
limits,  starting  again  when  rested  and  stronger,  after 
a  halt  for  meditation.  Never  was  the  oft  quoted  Latin 
proverb,  Labor  improbus  omnla  vincit,  more  fittingly 
applicable;  but  notwithstanding  the  proverb,  it  is  not 
true  that  determined  work  will  accomplish  everything ; 
grace,  in  the  Christian  sense,  is  also  needed;  works 
alone  will  not  save  a  man. 

Differing  in  this  from  born  painters,  to  whom  the 
subject  of  a  composition  is  almost  always  indifferent, 
and  who  make  hundreds  of  masterpieces  out  of  two  or 
three  insignificant  subjects,  Paul  Delaroche  was  always 
very  much  concerned  with  it.  In  this  respect  it  may 
be  said  that  he  belonged  to  the  middle  classes.  He 
tried  to  be  interesting,  which  is  a  matter  absolutely 
secondary  in  art.  If  a  visitor  in  a  gallery  of  paintings 
stops  before  a  picture,  and  instead  of  looking  at  it  and 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

enjoying  it,  first  turns  over  his  catalogue  to  find  out 
what  is  the  historical  scene  or  anecdote  represented, 
you  may  affirm  of  him,  without  fear  of  being  mistaken, 
that  unquestionably  the  man  does  not  love  painting. 

Delaroche  has  far  too  many  such  visitors.  Clean- 
ness of  outline,  power  or  delicacy  in  modelling, 
harmony  in  colour,  the  imitation  of  nature  idealised 
through  style,  are  far  more  important  than  curiosity  or 
the  selection  of  a  subject.  There  is  the  true,  the  only, 
the  unchanging  subject  of  painting.  Of  late  the  liter- 
ary idea  has  been  confounded  with  the  picturesque  idea, 
yet  no  two  things  can  be  more  dissimilar.  If  I  were 
to  say  that  a  picture  of  still  life  by  Chardon,  which 
represents  a  ray  fish,  a  bunch  of  celery,  a  stewpan,  or 
an  earthenware  jar  even,  has  the  picturesque  idea 
which  is  lacking  in  vast  cyclical,  genetical,  philosophi- 
cal, historical,  ethnographical,  and  prophetical  compo- 
sitions, I  should  probably  surprise  many  society  people, 
but  certainly,  I  should  not  surprise  artists,  who  are 
perfectly  well  aware  of  that  truth.  In  France  the 
feeling  for  plasticity  scarcely  exists;  beauty  in  itself 
does  not  interest  us.  The  multitude,  cold  and  inatten- 
tive, passes  by  a  Greek  torso,  headless,  armless,  legless, 
a  divine  fragment  which  sings  the  hymn  of  pure  beauty 

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PAUL    DELAROCHE 

in  its  mute  marble  language,  and  crowds  in  front  of  a 
painting  which  needs  a  page  of  explanations  in  small 
type  in  the  Salon  catalogue.  Delaroche's  success  with 
this  portion  of  the  public  was  therefore  immense  every 
time  he  allowed  them  to  see  his  pictures.  He  intro- 
duced the  drama  into  painting.  Every  one  of  his  works 
is  like  the  fifth  act  of  a  melodrama  or  of  a  tragedy,  and 
at  the  bottom  of  them  might  be  written,  as  a  last  direc- 
tion, "  Curtain." 

Our  people  prefer  a  dramatic  form,  for  it  suits  our 
simple,  accurate,  positive  minds.  Paul  Delaroche  was 
very  French  in  this  respect ;  he  himself  possessed  the 
taste  which  he  so  thoroughly  served.  At  bottom 
Ingres'  drawing  is  as  unpleasant  to  the  general  public 
as  Delacroix'  colour,  for  two  different  reasons.  These 
two  masters  cultivated  pure  art ;  that  is,  for  the  one,  line 
is  the  most  important  thing,  as  tone  is  for  the  other. 
They  do  not  delight  that  numerous  class  which  reads  a 
picture  as  it  would  one  of  Walter  Scott's  novels. 

It  is  strange  to  affirm  of  a  man  who  attained  every 
possible  honour  in  his  art,  that  he  mistook  his  vocation 
when  he  chose  painting,  which  brought  him  so  much 
renown  ;  but  after  having  paid  three  visits  to  the  exhibi- 
tion in  the  Palace  of  the  Fine  Arts,  I  cannot  help 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

feeling  that  Paul  Delaroche  would  have  succeeded 
much  better  on  the  stage ;  it  was  in  that  direction  that 
his  real  talent  lay,  for  he  possessed  remarkable  skill  in 
stage-setting  and  wonderful  knowledge  of  dramatic 
grouping,  and  even  —  to  be  quite  frank  —  of  the  way 
to  light  up  the  dead  and  the  beheaded. 

One  very  striking  fact,  brought  out  most  significantly 
by  the  exposition  in  the  Palace  of  Fine  Arts,  is  the 
uninterrupted  progress  of  the  artist  as  his  work  ad- 
vanced ;  the  merit  of  his  paintings  might  be  classified 
in  chronological  order  and  the  man  who  wanted  to 
have  the  best  need  only  carry  away  the  last.  If  he 
could  have  lived  to  a  hundred,  like  Titian,  he  would 
unquestionably  have  become  a  great  painter.  There 
is  something  touching  in  his  intelligent  and  reflective 
obstinacy,  which  progressed  towards  perfection  slowly 
but  surely,  never  discouraged,  understanding  what  it 
lacks,  seeking  to  acquire  it,  and  almost  managing,  in 
"  The  Christian  Martyr,"  to  produce  a  real  masterpiece 
after  so  many  sham  ones.  At  a  time  of  life  when 
decadence  has,  in  the  case  of  most  men,  long  since 
begun,  Paul  Delaroche  kept  on  rising. 

To  understand  how  great  is  the  distance  he  has 
traversed,  one  must  look  longer  than  they  deserve, 

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PAUL    DELAROCHE 

perhaps,  at  the  paintings  in  the  first  room,  the  oldest 
in  point  of  time,  and  it  will  be  seen  with  what  blind 
groping,  with  what  laborious  uncertainty,  with  what 
painful  stiffness,  the  painter's  will  makes  its  way 
through  all  obstacles.  The  one  idea  which  is  still 
quite  visible  is  the  subject,  ever  the  main  preoccupation 
of  Delaroche.  "  Joash  Saved  from  the  Dead,"  "  The 
Death  of  President  Duranti,"  "The  Death  of  Queen 
Elizabeth,"  "The  Massacre  of  Saint  Bartholomew," 
"  The  Death  of  Agostino  Caracci,"  "  Joan  of  Arc 
questioned  by  the  Cardinal  of  Winchester,"  —  all  these 
show  his  seeking  after  funereal  or  violent  scenes.  The 
drawing  is  weak,  the  forms  are  mean  or  exaggerated, 
the  colour  is  dull  or  staring ;  the  composition  alone  is 
remarkable  for  its  ingenious  or  theatrical  arrangement. 
Such  as  they  are,  at  the  time  when  they  were  first  ex- 
hibited these  paintings  must  have  attracted  the  atten- 
tion of  the  crowd,  although  they  could  not  satisfy  the 
severe  taste  of  connoisseurs.  Delaroche,  no  doubt, 
thought  them  worse  than  any  one  else  did,  for  no  one 
was  more  lucidly  critical  concerning  his  own  work. 

"  Cardinal  Richelieu  towing  Cinq-Mars  and  de 
Thou  behind  his  barge  on  the  Rhone,"  "  Cardinal 
Mazarin  watching  a  game  of  cards  from  his  bed," 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

mark  a  distinct  advance  in  the  artist's  work.  The 
composition  is  clever ;  the  colour,  in  spite  of  exagger- 
ated transparencies,  and  glaring  high-lights,  does  not 
affect  one  unpleasantly  j  the  faces  of  the  characters 
have  the  imprint  of  the  time,  the  costumes  are  cor- 
rect j  the  painter's  thought  is  readily  grasped,  and  the 
two  paintings,  reproduced  by  engravings,  are  hanging 
as  companions  on  the  walls  of  more  than  one  drawing- 
room  of  the  middle-class  public. 

I  believe  that  this  was  the  natural  turn  of  Delaroche's 
talent.  Episodical  history,  treated  within  these  limits, 
suited  his  powers,  which  were  delicate  rather  than 
strong.  "  The  Assassination  of  the  Duke  of  Guise," 
which  is  his  masterpiece,  proves  this.  In  this  case 
there  is  room  for  praise  only.  The  pale,  effeminate 
head  which  shows  at  the  door  and  gazes  fearfully  at 
the  great  body  that  lies  at  the  other  end  of  the  room 
murdered  by  ruffianly  cut-throats,  produces  a  dramatic 
impression  in  the  truest  sense  of  the  word ;  it  is  as 
genuine  as  a  scene  in  Shakespeare.  The  background, 
with  its  minute  realism,  imparts  reality  to  a  scene 
which  must  certainly  have  occurred  as  it  is  represented. 
The  personages  have  the  attitudes  of  bravi,  and  seem 
drawn  from  life  by  a  contemporary.  Never  was  the 

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A  tfc  jb  cfc  *  db  4?  4?  db  *?  *&  tlrs?  tl?  sS?  4?  s? ;f?  tS?  tt?  tt?  d?  tfc  db 

PAUL    DELAROCHE 

local   colour  of  any   period   better  or  more   faithfully 
reproduced. 

The  "  Jane  Grey "  is  a  Romanticist  painting  after 
the  fashion  of  Casimir  Delavigne,  with  whom  Paul 
Delaroche  had  much  in  common.  The  painter  and 
the  poet  might  have  exchanged  subjects  for  tragedies 
and  pictures;  they  both  understood  art  in  the  same 
way,  and  both,  therefore,  won  during  their  lifetime 
that  popular  success  which  serious  art  does  not  always 
obtain.  There  is  a  great  deal  of  skill  in  this  painting. 
The  straw  which  is  intended  to  soak  up  the  victim's 
blood  on  the  scaffold  deceives  the  eye,  and  more  than 
one  spectator  is  tempted  to  draw  out  a  piece  of  it. 
The  little  waxen  hands  of  Jane  Grey,  which  are  put 
out  and  seem  to  feel  for  the  block,  formerly  made 
a  deep  impression  upon  Philistine  sensibilities,  and 
possibly  still  do  so.  The  white  satin  of  the  skirt 
is  also  very  beautiful,  the  folds  are  nicely  broken  and 
shimmer  with  pearly  tones,  and  are  set  off  by  light 
shadows.  The  face  of  the  maid,  who  is  fainting  and 
leans  against  a  pillar,  recalls  in  its  costume  and  its 
adornment  certain  figures  of  Holbein,  although  it  lacks 
substance  and  is  as  flat  as  if  it  were  cut  out  of  paper 
and  stuck  on  the  gray  background ;  nevertheless,  there 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

is  a  certain  feeling  and  sentiment  about  it.  The  violet 
trunk-hose  of  the  executioner  is  empty,  and  the  legs 
which  it  is  supposed  to  cover  are  not  indicated  by  any 
anatomical  detail;  yet  the  contrast  between  the 
lovely  neck  and  the  heavy  axe  makes  one  shudder; 
and  it  would  always  be  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to 
make  a  French  public  understand  that  this  pathetic 
scene  is  not  a  good  painting,  and  that  the  smallest 
sketch  by  a  Venetian  of  the  decadence,  Tiepolo, 
Montemezzano,  Fumiani,  or  any  other  whose  name  is 
not  written  or  spoken  once  in  ten  years,  fulfils  much 
more  completely  the  conditions  of  art.  That  very 
defect  is  the  cause  of  Delaroche's  success.  Painting 
for  a  people  which  is  literary  above  all  things,  he  did 
not  paint,  but  wrote  his  pictures,  and  the  reasons  which 
led  me  to  blame  him  are  precisely  those  which  won 
him  success.  Yet  it  would  be  unfair  not  to  acknowl- 
edge that  there  is  a  great  deal  of  improvement  in  "  Jane 
Grey "  over  "  The  Death  of  Elizabeth,"  in  the  form 
at  least.  The  artist  does  what  he  wants  to  do,  he  has 
rendered  his  conception  absolutely ;  the  master  begins 
to  show. 

The   "  StrafFord "  annoys  the  eye  by  the  abuse  of 
black  tints,  which   have   an  ugly  look  of  shoe-black- 

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***  *****  4: 4. 4.4,4.4.4.4. 4.4.^4.4.  .1.4.4. 

PAUL    DELAROCHE 

ing.  Artists  who  are  colourists  skilfully  relieve  by 
means  of  glacis  and  reflections  that  tint  which  absorbs 
the  light  and  the  use  of  which  should  be  avoided  as 
much  as  possible.  Van  Dyck  very  often  painted 
figures  dressed  in  black,  but  he  did  not  indulge  in 
that  excess ;  he  avoided  the  violet  ink  shade,  and  im- 
parted instead  a  harmonious  warmth  which  consorts 
with  the  golden  whiteness  of  the  linen  of  the  collars. 
The  defects  in  Delaroche's  painting  are  not  visible 
in  the  engraving,  which  exhibits  merely  the  skilful 
arrangement  of  the  composition. 

In  his  "  Saint  Cecilia "  Paul  Delaroche  seems  to 
have  felt  the  influence  of  Ingres,  or  rather,  of  the  old 
Italian  masters.  He  has  filled  in  with  light  colour  the 
clearly  drawn  contours,  but  he  possesses  neither  the 
purity  of  drawing,  the  delicacy  of  modelling,  nor 
the  Gothic  artlessness,  which  are  the  real  charm  of 
these  archaic  imitations ;  he  cannot  interest  by  the 
expression  of  beauty  alone,  he  needs  a  subject,  a  scene. 
The  angels  which  support  the  organ  on  which  rest 
the  ecstatic  saint's  fingers,  are  merely  pretty ;  they 
lack  the  seraphic  idealism  of  the  figures  painted  by 
Angelo  da  Fiesole,  Perugino,  and  Giovanni  Bellini. 
But  on  the  other  hand,  the  drawing  which  he  made, 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

tinted  in  pastel,  for  a  stained-glass  window,  and  which 
represents  Saint  Amelia  offering  her  crown  to  the 
Virgin,  is  charming  and  worthy  in  every  respect  of 
being  engraved  by  Calamatta. 

It  is  to  this  period  that  belongs  the  "  Young  Italian 
and  her  Child."  Paul  Delaroche  here  attempted  style 
and  line.  He  sought  to  attain  to  the  severe  contour 
and  the  virile  bistre  colouring  of  the  great  masters 
of  the  Roman  school.  This  painting  exhibits  some 
striking  qualities,  but,  as  I  have  already  said,  such 
subjects,  which  are  excellent  for  thorough  painters,  do 
not  suit  Delaroche ;  they  are  not  significant  enough. 

"  A  Mother's  Choice  "  is  painted  in  a  dry,  conven- 
tional fashion.  The  auburn  hair,  bound  with  cherry- 
coloured  ribbons,  that  falls  in  waves  upon  rosy  flesh, 
denotes  the  desire  to  attain  a  harmony  which  a  Vene- 
tian would  have  secured  without  difficulty,  but  which 
is  dulled  by  the  brush  of  a  painter  who  is  less  of  a 
colourist. 

The  "Marie  Antoinette  in  Prison"  sins  through 
the  abuse  of  black  of  which  I  spoke  just  now.  Black, 
like  red,  green,  blue,  —  like  any  other  colour,  —  has 
lights,  half-tints,  and  shades ;  it  does  not  make  an 
absolutely  opaque  spot  amid  surrounding  objects,  it  is 

254 


PAUL    DELAROCHE 

connected  with  them  by  reflections,  by  the  distribution 
of  light,  by  breaks,  or  else  it  makes  a  hole  in  the 
painting.  The  Queen's  head  is  very  beautiful  and  full 
of  dignity.  The  artist  has  ventured  to  paint  her  with 
her  hair  prematurely  turned  white,  her  eyes  reddened 
by  tears,  her  face  discoloured  and  weary.  I  can  only 
regret  that  a  weak,  boneless,  unarticulated  hand  should 
press  against  the  skirt  a  white  handkerchief  which  looks 
like  a  flake  of  foam.  Among  the  faces  half  in  shadow 
which  crowd  in  the  narrow  passage  as  the  Queen  goes 
by,  some  expressing  pity  and  others  hatred,  some  bestial 
indifference  and  others  stupid  curiosity,  there  are  well- 
observed  and  well-rendered  types.  The  acute  feeling 
for  the  dramatic  which  is  characteristic  of  Delaroche 
betrays  itself  in  that  admirably  grouped  multitude. 

The  idea  of  representing  Napoleon  riding  on  a  mule 
was  bound  to  attract  and  did  attract  the  ingenious  artist 
in  search  of  incidents,  details,  and  anecdotes.  Person- 
ally I  prefer  David's  epic  conception,  but  the  crowd  is 
delighted  with  this  fac-simile,  for  it  must  have  been 
just  in  this  way  that  the  hero  crossed  the  Alps,  just  in 
that  dress,  and  led  by  a  guide  through  snow  which,  as 
it  fell  away,  did  not  allow  the  names  of  Hannibal  and 
Caesar  to  be  seen  inscribed  on  the  rocks. 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

The  head  of  "  Napoleon  at  Fontainebleau "  is  a 
good  likeness  and  is  wrought  with  some  style  and 
force,  but  you  may  be  sure  that  the  vulgar  chiefly 
admire  the  mud  stains  on  the  imperial  boots.  Whom 
are  we  to  blame,  the  painter  or  the  vulgar  crowd  ? 

The  last  paintings  of  Delaroche  show  immense 
progress.  His  "  Girondins  "  is  excellent.  Within  the 
proportions  of  a  genre  painting,  the  artist  has  managed 
to  give  us  a  real  historical  composition  without  any 
emphasis,  rhetoric,  affectation,  or  sham  poetry.  He 
has  overcome  with  infinite  taste  the  difficulties  pre- 
sented by  the  costume  of  the  time ;  he  has  given  the 
proper  likeness  to  every  head,  the  proper  expression, 
the  proper  manners,  so  to  speak.  As  for  "  The 
Christian  Martyr,"  there  is  on  that  pale  face  lighted 
by  the  halo,  a  reflection  of  the  grace  of  Correggio. 
The  small,  intimate  dramas  of  the  Passion,  although 
they  may  be  reproached  with  lowering  divine  suffering 
to  the  level  of  humanity,  are  full  of  sentiment,  of  a 
tender,  vague  colour,  of  emotional  effect,  of  suave 
touches,  and  prove  that  the  artist  was  entering  into  a* 
new  sphere  just  as  he  was  stopped  by  death.  A  num- 
ber of  pencil  sketches,  some  brought  out  by  pastel, 
deserve  to  be  mentioned  with  praise.  They  are  genu- 

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PAUL    DELAROCHE 

ine,  masterly  drawings,  to  which  colour  could  add 
nothing  and  which  it  might  very  well  spoil. 

M.  Goupil's  portrait  is  famous,  and  that  of  M.  Thiers 
is  greatly  lauded,  but  I  prefer  to  both  of  those  the  por- 
trait of  M.  E.  Pereire.  The  face  is  amazingly  well 
modelled,  with  its  gray  harmony,  and  the  hands  are 
perhaps  the  best  studied  out  ever  painted  by  Delaroche. 

On  leaving  the  exposition  I  passed  into  the  Hemi- 
cycle  where  the  prizes  are  awarded.  A  great  mural 
painting  spreads  under  the  cupola,  lighted  by  a  soft, 
uniform  light.  Henriquel-Dupont's  engraving  made 
this  beautiful  composition  so  familiar  to  every  one  that 
it  is  unnecessary  to  describe  it.  Mural  painting  has 
the  advantage  of  enlarging  the  manner  of  artists,  as  if 
painting  became  more  robust  when  it  comes  in  contact 
with  stone.  Paul  Delaroche,  without  equalling  the 
style  of  the  painters  whose  portraits  he  had  so  vigor- 
ously grouped  upon  the  marble  benches  of  that  ideal 
academy,  exhibits  here  unmistakable  qualities  of  draw- 
ing and  colour.  But  how  greatly  superior  is  the 
modified  reduction  to  the  original. 

And  now,  what  will  be  Paul  Delaroche's  place  in 
the  future  ?  He  will  be  in  painting  what  Casimir 
Delavigne  is  in  poetry. 

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Portraits    of  the    Day 


ARY    SCHEFFER 

BORN  IN  1795  —  DIED  IN  1858 


YOUNG  men  will    have    to  work    harder  and 
to  make  greater  efforts   in  order  to  maintain 
France    in    the    leading    position    which    she 
holds  in  the  arts.     They  have  to  fill  up  many  a  break 
in  the  sacred   phalanx,  for    death  seems  to  prefer   to 
strike  down    the  most  famous.     He    who  was   but  a 
private  yesterday,  is  now  a  captain.     Let  him  remem- 
ber that  he  has   to  maintain  the  honour  of  the  flag. 
But  alas  !  such  is  life,  and  as  Glaucus  said  so  many 
centuries  ago,  — 

"As  the  leaves  from  the  wood,  so  vanish  the  races  of  men. 
The  wind  casts  down  and  dries  the  leaves,  but  in  the  spring 
come  other  leaves  and  other  buds.  Thus  with  mankind,  — 
the  one  comes,  the  other  goes." 

I  did  not  know  Ary  SchefFer  personally,  and  I  regret 
it,  for  he  was  one  of  the  most  remarkable  figures  of  our 
age,  which  posterity  will  count  among  the  climacteric 
epochs  of  human  genius.  But  the  stream  of  life  bore 


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ARY    SCHEFFER 

me  elsewhere,  and  that  face  is  lacking  in  my  Pantheon. 
Those  who  saw  him  tell  me  that  he  had  a  fine  roman- 
tic head,  as  passionate  and  as  deep-marked  as  one 
might  imagine  Faust's  to  have  been,  a  dark  complexion, 
silvered  in  later  years  by  long  locks  of  white  hair  and 
tufts  of  gray  beard,  with  a  dreamy,  melancholy, 
spiritual  expression,  entirely  in  harmony  with  his  talent. 
He  looked  what  he  was  expected  to  look  like,  which  is 
a  rare  thing,  and  people  did  not  say  of  him  as  of  other 
artists  no  less  great,  "  I  fancied  he  looked  differently." 
The  first  appearance  of  Ary  SchefFer  took  place  at 
the  period  of  glorious  Renaissance  which  saw  rise  at 
one  and  the  same  time  Eugene  Deveria,  Bonnington, 
Eugene  Delacroix,  Louis  Boulanger,  Decamps,  Roque- 
plan,  Saint-Evre,  Poterlet,  Paul  Huet,  Cabat,  Theo- 
dore Rousseau,  David  d'Angers,  Preault,  and  so  many 
other  fiery  champions  of  liberty  in  art.  Ary  SchefFer 
was  one  of  the  first  to  break  with  the  old  academic 
traditions  —  his  German  origin  made  Romanticism 
come  easily  and  naturally  to  him.  All  minds  were 
then  turned  towards  Greece,  which  was  fighting  to 
conquer  its  independence  ;  every  poet,  every  painter 
testified  to  this  generous  preoccupation  by  a  song,  or  by 
a  painting.  Ary  SchefFer  painted  the  "  Women  of 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

Suli."  You  remember  that  these  heroines,  in  order 
to  escape  the  brutality  of  Ali  Pacha's  men,  threw 
themselves  from  the  top  of  a  cliff.  It  was  a  fine  sub- 
ject for  a  painting.  Ary  Scheffer  treated  it  with  a  fire 
of  colour  and  a  freedom  of  touch  much  more  surpris- 
ing at  that  time  than  now,  and  introduced  into  it  at  the 
same  time,  a  passionate  grace,  a  pathetic  sentimentality 
which  even  now  may  be  admired. 

Like  many  masters  Ary  Scheffer  had  two  manners, 
but  the  first  has  almost  no  relation  to  the  second,  and 
might  be  that  of  another  painter.  In  his  first  manner 
he  sought  for  colour  effects,  used  bitumen  to  excess,  and 
worked  with  rough  touches,  so  that  his  paintings  pre- 
served the  appearance  of  sketches.  He  seemed  to 
prefer  poetry,  inspiration,  and  feeling  to  laborious 
correctness.  He  was,  to  use  a  term  the  meaning 
of  which  was  more  clearly  understood  formerly  than 
nowadays,  a  real  Romanticist  painter ;  he  had  cast 
away  the  old,  trite  models  used  by  the  school  of  David, 
would  have  nothing  to  do  with  mythology,  but  bor- 
rowed his  subjects  from  Goethe,  Byron,  Burger,  and 
the  old  German  legends.  In  a  word,  he  was  orthodox 
in  heresy.  What  distinguished  him  from  his  rivals, 
who  were  more  exclusively  painters  than  he,  is  that  he 

260 


ARY    SCHEFFER 


did  not  turn  to  his  palette  when  excited  directly  by  the 
sight  of  things;  he  seemed  to  warm  himself  up  by 
reading  the  poets,  and  then  to  seek  for  forms  which 
would  express  his  literary  impressions.  Instead  of 
looking  at  nature  directly,  he  contemplated  her  re- 
flection in  a  masterpiece.  He  saw  with  his  mind's  eye 
Marguerite  traversing  the  drama  of  "  Faust  ;  "  very 
possibly  he  would  not  have  noticed  her  had  he  met  her 
in  the  street.  This  defect,  if  it  be  one,  harmonised  too 
well  with  the  passionate  fondness  for  the  reading  of 
poets  then  felt  by  a  young  public  not  to  have  been 
reckoned  a  merit  in  the  artist,  who  thus  realised  types 
dear  to  every  one. 

I  remember  the  effect  produced  by  his  first  "  Mar- 
guerite," for  Ary  Scheffer  painted  quite  a  number. 
This  was  a  half-length  seated  figure,  in  an  atti- 
tude of  sorrowful  meditation.  Her  pale,  fair  hair 
was  dressed  in  bandeaux  upon  her  delicate  temples, 
slightly  veined  with  azure  ;  on  the  upper  part  of  the 
forehead  there  was  a  touch  of  silver  light  which  was 
prolonged  to  and  vanished  on  the  edge  of  the  pro- 
file. The  rest  of  the  head,  melting  and,  as  it  were, 
etherealised  within  an  azure  shadow,  resembling  the 
light  of  German  moonbeams,  disappeared,  vanished, 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

became  idealised  like  the  remembrance  of  a  dream, 
through  which  shone  the  glance  of  an  eye  as  blue  as  a 
forget-me-not.  It  was  the  shadow  of  a  shade,  and  yet 
full  of  morbid  charm,  of  sickly  voluptuousness,  of  pas- 
sionate languor.  No  doubt  the  neck  was  too  long  and 
too  thin,  more  like  a  bird's  than  a  woman's ;  the  veins 
of  the  slender,  almost  transparent  hands,  were  too  blue ; 
but  a  soul  lived  within  the  body  itself,  faintly  indi- 
cated on  the  background,  felt  more  than  painted,  and 
the  light  of  the  soul,  like  that  of  a  lamp,  illumined  the 
picture  with  marvellous  beauty.  It  was,  at  one  and 
the  same  time,  Marguerite  and  German  poetry,  a  trans- 
lation of  Goethe  more  accurate  in  its  vague  fluidity  than 
the  literary  translations  of  Stappfer,  Gerard,  and  Henri 
Blaze,  and  the  youth  of  the  day  was  intoxicated  with 
this  new  enchantment,  and  refused  to  listen  to  the 
morose  critics  who  protested  in  the  name  of  osteology, 
myology,  and  sound  doctrine.  His  "  Faust "  also  was 
greatly  admired,  and  rightly.  "The  Giaour,"  whom 
Eugene  Delacroix  had  represented  in  the  battle  with 
the  terrible  Hassan,  with  a  fury  of  motion  and  a  splen- 
dour of  colour  which  he  probably  never  surpassed,  was 
also  painted  by  Ary  SchefFer,  but  in  an  entirely  different 
fashion,  as  the  solitary  embodiment  of  Byronian  poetry  : 

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ARY    SCHEFFER 

"  His  floating  robe  around  him  folding, 
Slow  sweeps  he  through  the  columned  aisle  ; 
With  dread  beheld,  with  gloom  beholding 
The  rites  that  sanctify  the  pile. 
But  when  the  anthem  shakes  the  choir, 
And  kneel  the  monks,  his  steps  retire ; 
By  yonder  lone  and  wavering  torch 
His  aspect  glares  within  the  porch ; 
There  will  he  pause  till  all  is  done  — 
And  hear  the  prayer,  but  utter  none. 
See  —  by  the  half-illumined  wall 
His  hood  fly  back,  his  dark  hair  fall, 
That  pale  brow  wildly  wreathing  round, 
As  if  the  Gorgon  there  had  bound 
The  sablest  of  the  serpent-braid 
That  o'er  her  fearful  forehead  strayed; 
For  he  declines  the  convent  oath, 
And  leaves  those  locks'  unhallowed  growth." 

Never  was  there  a  finer  illustration  —  I  use  this 
word  purposely  —  made  of  a  poetic  type. 

Let  me  also  recall  "  Leonora "  watching  from  the 
city  gates  the  passage  of  the  army  in  which  she  misses 
her  lover.  The  painter,  no  doubt  in  the  interest  of  cos- 
tume, indulged  in  a  slight  anachronism  and  put  back 
two  or  three  centuries  the  time  of  the  fantastic  story 
told  in  Burger's  ballad,  but  Leonora's  face  exhibited 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

the  liveliest  grief,  and  the  painting  had  a  most  romantic 
charm. 

"The  King  of  Thule"  and  "  Eberhard  the 
Weeper"  also  belong  to  this  first  period.  The  pale 
sweet  head  of  the  young  man  lying  in  his  armour  was 
greatly  admired.  Rarely  had  death  appeared  more 
graceful,  and  in  presence  of  the  picture  one  recalled 
Byron's  verses  at  the  beginning  of  "  The  Giaour," 
on  the  supreme  beauty  which  precedes  the  moment  of 
decomposition  in  people  who  have  died  a  violent  death. 

At  that  time  Ary  Scheffer  appears  to  have  felt  the 
influence  which  induced  him  to  change  his  manner. 
No  doubt  every  master,  when  he  has  reached  the 
maturity  of  his  talent,  stops,  looks  back  over  the  road 
he  has  traversed,  and  recollects  himself;  he  feels  it 
necessary  to  come  to  a  decision ;  according  to  his  tem- 
perament, he  grows  calmer  or  more  fiery ;  he  holds 
himself  in  or  he  pushes  on.  Some  remain  on  the 
plateau,  others  start  to  climb  a  higher  summit.  If 
the  crisis  is  not  to  prove  fatal,  the  artist  who  feels 
admiration  for  another  must  not  renounce  his  own 
powers,  and  must  not  seek  perfection  outside  of  the 
means  at  his  disposal.  Certainly  Ingres  is  a  model 
who  may  be  safely  offered  to  young  students.  He 

264 


ART    SCHEFFER 


possesses  the  great  traditions  of  art,  the  feeling  for  an- 
tiquity, drawing,  style,  but  I  think  he  is  dangerous  to 
talents  already  formed.  In  my  opinion  Ary  SchefFer 
thought  too  much  of  this  great  artist.  His  "  Marguer- 
ite coming  out  of  Church  "  showed  in  the  work  of 
the  painter,  who  until  then  had  been  Romanticist,  a 
somewhat  dry,  clean  outline,  not  justified  by  sufficient 
accuracy.  "  Faust  beholding  the  Phantom  of  Mar- 
guerite in  the  Witches'  Sabbath  "  is  conceived  in  the 
same  style  :  the  colour,  as  pale  as  a  wash,  is  contained 
by  sharp  lines.  The  subject,  it  seems  to  me,  required 
more  mystery,  and  the  white  shade  which  bears  on 
the  neck  a  red  streak  as  broad  as  the  back  of  a  knife, 
would  have  been  improved  by  less  distinctness.  Re- 
gretting his  early  neglect  of  line,  Ary  SchefFer  tried  to 
become  a  draughtsman,  but  one  cannot  go  in  later  life 
from  colour  to  drawing,  which  requires  a  particular 
temperament  and  long  years  of  work  at  the  age  when 
a  man  studies,  and  not  at  that  when  he  performs.  For 
a  man  to  do  a  thing,  he  must  first  know  it;  there  is  no 
longer  time  to  learn,  and  Ary  SchefFer  was  wrong  to 
abandon,  at  the  flood  tide  of  his  reputation,  the  vague, 
soft,  graceful,  morbid  manner  that  was  personal 
to  him  and  which  so  admirably  interpreted  his  ideas, 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

which  were  more  literary  than  plastic.  By  the  change 
he  lost  colour,  chiaroscuro,  and  his  own  touch,  while 
he  did  not  acquire  line.  Yet  his  success  was  main- 
tained, because  Ary  Scheffer  could  not  renounce  his 
own  style.  "  Francesca  and  Paolo "  passing  against 
the  black  background  of  hell  like  two  wounded  doves, 
captivated  the  attention  of  the  public,  which  under- 
stood the  poetical  thought  only,  and  did  not  take  note 
of  the  meagre  drawing  and  modelling.  "  Mignon 
mourning  her  country "  and  "  Mignon  aspiring  to 
Heaven "  are  unlike  the  living,  real,  feminine  and 
not  at  all  celestial  type  described  by  Goethe  in 
"Wilhelm  Meister's  Years  of  Apprenticeship  and 
Travel,"  and  it  is  difficult  to  recognise  in  that  melan- 
choly, over-spiritualised  figure  the  ardent  nostalgia  of 
the  precocious  little  girl  who  performed  a  country 
dance  in  a  page's  dress  and  slipped  at  night  into  the 
room  of  the  beloved  Wilhelm,  though  not  on  a 
moonbeam.  Yet  Ary  Scheffer's  "  Mignon  "  has  been 
so  completely  accepted  that  it  has  little  by  little  taken 
the  place  of  the  poet's  creation,  and  that  a  real  portrait 
of  her  would  now  be  considered  unlike  by  every  one, 
even  if  it  whispered  with  true  Southern  passion, 
"  Know'st  thou  the  land  where  the  orange  blooms  ?  " 

266 


ARY    SCHEFFER 


In  his  "  Christus  Remunerator  "  Ary  SchefFer  made 
a  supreme  effort  to  rise  to  style.  The  composition  is 
well  ordered,  the  idea,  though  humanitarian  rather  than 
religious,  was  capable  of  suggesting  fine  motives  to  a 
painter.  But  with  our  artist  the  hand  often  failed  to 
carry  out  the  purpose,  and  here  the  intention  is  greater 
than  the  performance.  "Dante  and  Beatrix,"  "Saint 
Augustine  and  Saint  Monica,"  perpetuate  his  system 
of  lengthening  which  causes  the  body  to  disappear 
under  the  stiff  folds  of  draperies  in  order  to  bring  out 
strongly  a  head,  frail  and  sickly  in  its  beauty,  which 
looks  up  to  heaven. 

But  this  is  not  the  time  to  discuss  technically  the 
work  of  the  famous  artist  who  has  just  gone  down  to 
the  grave.  Ary  SchefFer  leaves  a  reputation  which  will 
be  increased  by  the  admirable  engravings  of  his  work, 
for  these  reproduce  his  qualities  merely.  The  graver 
excels  in  rendering  the  thought  in  a  picture,  and  Ary 
ScherFer's  paintings  are  pure  thought  only.  Let  Ingres, 
Delacroix,  Decamps,  all  the  well  rounded,  robust 
painters  be  preferred  to  him,  —  that  is  right;  yet  Ary 
SchefFer's  place  is  not  to  be  disdained.  He  was  the 
Novalis  of  painting  ;  if  he  did  not  possess  an  artist's 
temperament,  he  had  an  artist's  soul.  His  life,  a  most 

267 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

honourable  one,  was  filled  with  noble  aspirations  only ; 
faith,  thought,  work,  gratitude,  occupied  him  until  the 
last  instant.  Let  me  add  one  last  word.  Ary  Scheffer 
was  a  transposed  poet.  Dante,  Goethe,  and  Byron 
were  his  masters,  rather  than  Michael  Angelo,  Raphael, 
or  Titian.  He  painted  in  accord  with  their  concep- 
tions, perhaps  he  ought  to  have  sung  like  them. 


268 


Portraits    of  the    Day 


HORACE   VERNET 

BORN  IN  1789  —  DIED  IN  1865 


I    SHALL  not   trouble   with   biographical    details. 
All  I  know  of  the  man  is  his  work,  and  that  I 
am  going  to  speak  of,  —  its  meaning,  its  value, 
its  individuality  ;  for  an  account  of  the  paintings  pro- 
duced  by   that    indefatigable  worker  would   require   a 
whole  volume,  and  not  a  mere  article. 

It  is  remarkable  that  Horace  Vernet  did  not  take 
sides  in  any  of  the  burning  questions  of  art  which  so 
deeply  stirred  the  earlier  years  of  the  present  century. 
He  was  claimed  neither  by  the  school  of  style  nor  by 
that  of  colour  he  always  escaped  the  hyperbolical 
praises  and  the  acrimonious  insults  which  the  two  par- 
ties lavished  on  each  other  in  those  days.  In  the  midst 
of  the  tumult  he  peacefully  enjoyed  a  popularity  which 
the  chiefs  of  the  rival  schools,  in  spite  of  their  un- 
doubted genius  and  the  efforts  of  their  followers,  never 
attained.  The  multitude  did  not  need  to  be  initiated 
before  it  could  understand  him.  He  was  readily  com- 

269 


££±4;  4;  4;  4;  4, 4;  £  ************** 

PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

prehended,  for  he  possessed  a  very  rare  quality  which 
pedants  do  not  prize  much,  the  vision  of  modern 
things.  Nothing  seems  easier  than  to  paint  what  one 
constantly  sees.  Well,  that  is  an  error  which  can  be 
proved  by  strolling  through  a  gallery  of  paintings.  It 
is  surprising  to  notice  how  little  the  illustrious  painters 
of  all  ages,  of  all  countries,  have,  outside  of  a  few  por- 
traits, succeeded  in  reproducing  the  aspect  of  their 
times  and  of  their  environments.  The  imitation  of 
antiquity,  the  striving  after  idealism  or  style,  the  superb 
disdain  which  historical  painting  manifests  for  reality, 
the  taste  for  composition  and  transposition,  fashionable 
mannerisms,  almost  always  draw  artists  away  from 
present-day  subjects,  which  they  take  up  apparently 
with  regret  and  which  they  generally  misrepresent. 

So  the  painter  who  devotes  himself  to  the  faithful 
representation  of  contemporary  facts  requires  very 
peculiar  courage,  a  predisposition  to  genius,  for  he 
has  no  precedents  and  no  models  other  than  those 
which  reality  offers  him.  If  a  painter  wishes  to  de- 
pict the  battle  of  Hercules  and  Antaeus,  he  can  turn 
to  statues,  to  medals,  to  gems,  to  engravings,  to 
paintings,  to  a  whole  academic  tradition;  but  these 
resources  are  wholly  lacking  if  it  is  a  question  of 

270 


HORACE    VERNET 


painting  a  fight  between  a  veteran  of  the  Old  Guard 
and  a  Cossack. 

Although  he  does  not  draw  the  eye  by  any  peculiar- 
ities, yet  no  one  is  more  original  than  Horace  Vernet. 
He  owes  nothing  to  antiquity;  the  Greeks  and  the 
Romans  do  not  seem  to  have  existed  as  far  as  he  was 
concerned.  It  is  impossible  to  compare  him  with 
the  battle  painters  who  preceded  him.  He  resembles 
neither  Raphael  in  "  The  Battle  of  Constantine,"  nor 
Lebrun  in  u  The  Conquests  of  Alexander,"  nor  Sal- 
vator  Rosa,  nor  Bourguignon,  nor  Van  der  Meulen,  nor 
Gros,  the  epic  painter  of  Aboukir  and  Eylau.  In  his 
battle  work  perhaps  he  recalls  faintly  Carl  Vernet,  but 
that  is  allowable  in  a  son. 

Horace  Vernet's  glory  is  the  result  of  his  having 
dared,  first  and  foremost,  to  paint  a  modern  battle,  not 
an  episode  of  a  fight,  —  that  is,  a  dozen  warriors 
sabring  each  other  in  the  foreground,  upon  rearing 
horses  which  trample  under  foot  the  classical  wounded 
soldier,  —  but  a  real  collision  of  two  armies,  with  their 
lines  deployed  or  concentrating,  the  artillery  gallop- 
ing the  batteries  thundering,  the  staffs  and  the  ambu- 
lances, on  some  vast  plain,  the  natural  chessboard 
of  great  strategic  combinations.  He  understood  that 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

the   modern   hero   is  that  collective  Achilles    which  is 
called  a  regiment. 

Instead  of  mourning  the  ugliness  of  our  costumes, 
which  are  so  rebellious  to  picturesqueness,  Horace 
Vernet  quietly  accepted  the  man  dressed  in  modern 
garb.  In  his  work  the  coat  took  the  place  of  the 
much  regretted  torso,  the  cloak  with  its  collar  did  not 
seem  to  him  inferior  to  the  pallium  of  antiquity,  and  as 
there  were  no  cothurns,  he  blacked  jack-boots.  He 
knew  uniforms  as  thoroughly  as  a  clothing  officer ;  the 
army  clothing  stores  gave  up  all  their  secrets  to  him. 
He  was  accurately  acquainted  with  the  number  of  but- 
tons, the  colour  of  the  braiding,  the  cut  of  the  skirts 
and  facings,  the  stamping  of  the  shako  plates,  with  the 
proper  way  to  strap  haversacks,  to  cross  belts,  with  the 
cocks  of  the  muskets,  the  grenades  or  the  horns  upon 
cartridge  boxes,  with  long  and  short  gaiters,  with 
fatigue  dress  and  full  dress  ;  and  better  than  all  with 
the  appearance  of  the  soldier  by  the  camp  fire  or  under 
fire,  with  his  usual  characteristic  attitudes,  with  the 
foot-soldier's  shrug  of  the  shoulders,  with  the  dragging 
walk  of  the  cavalryman,  with  the  special  type  of  each 
arm  or  of  each  campaign.  No  one  better  than  he 
reproduced  the  military  chic  of  a  particular  time,  —  if 

272 


HORACE    VERNET 


I  may  be  forgiven  that  piece  of  studio  slang,  which  is 
not  an  academical  expression,  it  is  true,  but  which 
renders  my  meaning. 

Having  painted  the  soldier  of  the  Republic  and  of 
the  Empire,  and  preserved  his  special  characteristics,  he 
assimilated  just  as  easily  the  soldier  of  the  African 
army  whom  he  painted  with  an  accuracy  of  type, 
colour,  and  go  which  was  never  once  at  fault.  And  it 
is  perhaps  just  as  meritorious  to  bring  out  the  character- 
istic traits  of  an  army  as  to  imitate  a  Syracusan  medal. 

In  order  to  paint  battles,  a  man  must  be  able  to 
paint  horses.  Many  artists  of  talent  have  failed  in  this 
respect.  The  horse  is,  next  to  man,  the  most  difficult 
creature  to  represent  correctly.  It  possesses  a  compli- 
cated anatomy  which  calls  for  prolonged  study;  its 
paces,  half  natural  and  half  acquired,  are  really  under- 
stood by  a  thorough  horseman  only,  and  to  show  the 
horse  moving  under  the  rider  without  misrepresenting 
the  seat  or  the  gait  is  a  perilous  undertaking  for  any 
one  who  has  not  long  been  familiar  with  stables,  riding- 
schools,  drill-grounds,  and  battle-fields. 

In  this,  as  in  everything  else,  Horace  Vernet  owed 
nothing  to  tradition.  He  did  not  paint  the  heavy,  his- 
torical horse  of  monstrous  proportions  with  which  art 

18  273 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

was  satisfied  in  the  days  when  the  importance  given  to 
the  human  figure  caused  accessories  to  be  neglected ; 
nor  did  he  set  his  dragoons  and  cuirassiers,  like  the 
white  cavalry  of  the  Parthenon,  upon  the  noble  animals 
with  swelling  necks  and  hog  manes  which  are  carved 
in  Pentelic  marble.  He  actually  was  bold  enough  to 
represent  modern  horses,  their  breed,  gait,  and  charac- 
teristics. They  certainly  have  not  the  poetic  beauty 
of  the  steeds  painted  by  Gros,  nor  the  vigour  of  those 
whose  muscles  Gericault  interwove  under  a  shimmer- 
ing, veiny  skin  ;  but  they  are  irreproachable  from  the 
horseman's  point  of  view,  and  the  artist  shows  them 
dashing  forward,  held  in,  spurred  on,  rearing,  galloping, 
leaping  hedges,  falling  to  the  ground,  coming  head  on, 
in  profile,  from  behind,  foreshortened,  in  the  air,  —  in 
every  possible  pose,  in  a  word,  with  the  ease,  the 
rapidity,  and  the  certainty  of  a  man  for  whom  there 
are  no  such  things  as  difficulties. 

To  all  these  qualities,  which  are  indispensable  to  a 
battle  painter,  he  united  a  keen  feeling  for  the  topogra- 
phy of  a  landscape ;  he  could  reproduce  exactly  the  lay 
of  the  ground  on  which  had  been  fought  great  battles, 
the  subjects  of  his  paintings,  while  preserving  the  aspect 
of  nature  and  the  picturesque  effect.  And  as  a  man 

274 


************************ 

HORACE    VERNET 

does  thoroughly  well  only  what  he  is  fond  of,  he  adored 
war;  in  him  the  artist  was  partly  a  soldier.  One  of 
his  paintings  represents  fairly  well  this  double  charac- 
ter. It  represents  his  studio.  In  one  corner  there  is 
a  horse  in  a  loose  box  ;  weapons  of  all  kinds  are  hang- 
ing on  the  walls ;  some  of  the  pupils  are  fencing ;  an 
idler  sounds  the  charge,  another  is  drumming ;  a  model 
is  posing  on  the  table,  and  the  painter,  in  front  of  his 
easel,  is  working  peacefully  in  the  midst  of  the  noise, 
which  he  enjoys,  for  Horace  Vernet  was  endowed  with 
extraordinary  facility.  When  he  started  to  paint  on  a 
fresh  canvas,  you  could  have  sworn  that  he  was  un- 
covering a  subject  already  painted  and  covered  over 
with  tissue  paper,  so  infallible  was  the  rapidity  with 
which  the  various  portions  came  out  under  his  brush. 
His  prodigious  memory  for  things  almost  saved  him 
the  trouble  of  making  sketches ;  it  drew  in  the  camera 
obscura  of  his  brain  whatever  was  reflected  in  it :  the 
silhouette  of  a  town,  the  profile  of  a  soldier,  the  shape 
of  a  utensil,  the  detail  of  a  costume,  the  arabesque  form 
of  a  braiding,  the  number  on  a  button,  the  handle  of  a 
yataghan,  an  Arab  saddle,  a  Kabyle  mosque,  —  and  he 
drew  all  his  information  from  that  unfailing  portfolio, 
which  he  did  not  even  need  to  open  and  to  run  through. 

275 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

With  his  very  first  paintings,  "  The  Trumpeter's 
Horse,"  "  The  Regimental  Dog,"  which  were  followed 
by  the  battles  of  "  Jemmappes,"  "  Valmy  "  "  Hanau," 
"  Montmirail,"  and  "  The  Clichy  Toll  Gate,"  Horace 
Vernet  conquered  his  public.  People  admired  his 
thoroughly  French  qualities, — cleverness,  clearness, 
ease,  accuracy.  The  subjects  which  he  preferred  to 
treat  were  bound  to  charm  a  nation  in  whom  the  mili- 
tary feeling  has  always  been  so  strong.  The  African 
campaigns  provided  him  with  vast  compositions  such 
as  "  The  Taking  of  Constantine,"  "  The  Battle  of 
Isly,"  "The  Smalah,"  in  which  his  fully  developed 
talent  shows  most  brilliantly.  These  works,  of  a  size 
not  usually  attempted  by  painters,  have  something  of 
the  illusion  and  of  the  magic  effect  produced  by  pano- 
ramas, and  the  artist  has  carried  in  them  to  a  very  high 
degree  the  power  of  illusion,  a  secondary  merit,  doubt- 
less, but  one  not  to  be  despised  and  which  greatly  im- 
presses the  public.  "  The  Smalah,"  in  which  are 
exhibited  the  peculiarities  of  Arab  life  caught  in  pictur- 
esque disorder  by  a  sudden  invasion,  with  its  charming 
barbaric  luxury  thrown  under  the  horses'  hoofs,  offered 
an  admirable  opportunity  to  the  painter  to  vary  by 
means  of  piquant  contrasts  the  regulation  monotony  of 

276 


************************ 

HORACE    VERNET 

uniforms.  Horace  Vernet,  without  being  a  brilliant 
colourist  like  Eugene  Delacroix,  turned  to  very  good 
account  the  quaint  weapons,  the  gold-striped  stuffs,  the 
coffers  inlaid  with  mother-of-pearl,  the  silver-sheathed 
kandjars,  the  multi-coloured  ataticbes,  —  a  sort  of  palan- 
quin in  which  Oriental  jealousy  conceals  its  women 
when  travelling.  A  silvery,  clear  tone,  such  as  is  pro- 
duced by  the  white  African  light,  illuminates  this  long, 
frieze-like  canvas,  which  remains  one  of  the  artist's 
best  works. 

Algeria  also  inspired  Horace  with  biblical  subjects 
for  a  few  easel  paintings,  in  which  the  characters  of 
the  Old  Testament  are  clothed  in  Arab  burnouses,  as 
more  probable  than  the  classical  costume  in  which  the 
great  masters  have  clothed  them.  The  unchanging 
East  preserves  its  customs  almost  eternally,  and  the 
patriarchs  could  not  have  been  very  different  from 
modern  Bedouins  ;  but  this  change,  in  spite  of  its  archae- 
ological probability,  proved  unpleasant  to  eyes  accus- 
tomed to  the  conventional  draperies  and  ornaments  of 
vague  origin  in  which  art  has  always  clothed  these 
respectable  and  distinguished  figures.  The  Bedouin 
quaintness  is  not  very  objectionable,  however,  in  such 
subjects  as  "  Thamar  "  or  u  Rebecca  and  Eleazar." 

277 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

"Swan-necked  Edith,"  "Judith  and  Holofernes," 
"  Raphael  meeting  Michael  Angelo  on  the  Steps  of 
the  Vatican,"  "The  Pope  borne  by  the  Segestaria," 
belong  to  the  historical  style  of  painting  properly  so- 
called,  and  in  them  the  individual  qualities  of  the  artist 
have  been  unable  to  display  themselves  as  freely  as  in 
his  other  works.  His  clean,  rapid,  facile  manner  does 
not  make  up  for  the  lack  of  style. 

Never  was  a  reputation  so  widespread  as  that  of 
Horace  Vernet,  who  is  better  known  to  foreigners  than 
any  painter  of  our  modern  school,  while  his  works 
fetch  large  prices  abroad.  His  well  rilled  career  has 
lacked  no  form  of  glory,  and  he  closes  in  triumphal 
fashion  the  illustrious  dynasty  of  the  Vernets.  Of  an 
eminently  French  nature,  made  to  delight  the  French, 
he  will  live  with  Scribe,  Auber,  and  Beranger. 


278 


Portraits  of  the  D  ay 


EUGENE   DELACROIX 

BORN  IN  1798  —  DIED  IN   1863 

EUG£NE  DELACROIX  was  scarcely  sixty- 
five,  and  he  looked  younger,  for  his  thick 
black  hair  had  not  a  single  silver  thread 
in  it.  He  was  not  robust,  but  his  fine,  energetic,  and 
nervous  temperament  gave  promise  of  longer  life.  In- 
tellectual strength  made  up  for  physical  strength  in 
him,  and  he  was  thus  able  to  indulge  in  ceaseless  activ- 
ity. No  career  was  better  filled  out  than  his  own, 
although  it  was  broken  off  so  abruptly.  Delacroix  lived 
as  long  as  Titian,  if  his  years  are  reckoned  by  his  works. 
He  was  a  pupil  of  Guerin,  the  painter  of  "  Dido  "  and 
•"  Clytemnestra,"  who  had  also  Gericault  and  Ary  Schef- 
fer  for  pupils.  He  exhibited  for  the  first  time  at  the 
Salon  of  1822.  The  picture  was  his  "  Dante  and  Vir- 
gil," which  his  master,  startled  by  the  tremendous  dash 
of  the  work,  advised  him  not  to  send  in.  This  picture, 
which  broke  away  so  abruptly  from  academic  tradition, 
called  out  enthusiastic  praise  on  the  one  hand  and  vio- 

279 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

lent  opposition  on  the  other,  and  marked  the  opening  of 
that  long  battle  which  lasted  as  long  as  the  artist  lived. 
The  Romanticist  movement,  spreading  from  poetry 
into  art,  adopted  Eugene  Delacroix  and  defended  him 
against  the  attacks  of  the  rival  camp.  M.  Thiers,  who 
was  then  the  art  critic  on  the  "  Constitutionnel,"  wrote 
about  this  picture,  so  much  praised  and  so  much  criti- 
cised, these  remarkable  lines  :  "  At  the  sight  of  this 
painting,  I  am  filled  with  an  indefinable  remembrance 
of  the  great  masters.  I  find  in  it  that  wild,  ardent,  but 
natural  power  which  yields  without  effort  to  its  own 
impulse."  As  a  matter  of  fact,  Eugene  Delacroix 
was  henceforth  a  master.  He  was  no  one's  imitator, 
and,  without  having  to  grope,  he  had  entered  into 
possession  of  his  own  individuality.  Whatever  his 
detractors  may  say,  he  did  introduce  into  French  paint- 
ing a  new  element,  —  colour,  in  the  widest  meaning  of 
the  word.  The  "  Massacre  of  Scio,"  which  was 
exhibited  in  the  Salon  of  1824,  filled  up  the  measure 
of  the  wrath  of  the  Classical  school.  That  scene  of 
desolation,  reproduced  in  its  full  horror  without  a 
thought  of  conventionality,  —  such,  in  a  word,  as  it 
must  have  occurred, —  evoked  an  outburst  of  fury  which 
it  is  difficult  to  understand  to-day  when  one  marks  the 

280 


EUG^ENE     DELACROIX 

passion,  the  depth  of  sentiment,  the  intensely  brilliant 
colour,  the  thoroughly  free  and  vigorous  execution  of 
the  painting.  From  that  day,  the  jury  often  refused  the 
paintings  of  the  innovating  artist,  but  Eugene  Delacroix 
was  not  a  man  easily  discouraged ;  he  returned  to  the 
charge  with  the  obstinacy  of  a  man  who  is  conscious 
of  his  own  genius.  "  The  Death  of  the  Doge  Marino 
Faliero,"  "  Christ  in  the  Garden  of  Olives,"  "  Faust 
and  Mephistopheles,"  "  Justinian,"  "  Sardanapalus," 
"  The  Battle  of  the  Giaour  and  the  Pacha,"  followed 
each  other  amid  a  storm  of  praise  and  insults. 

To  Delacroix  was  applied  the  epithet  invented  for 
Shakespeare,  "  drunken  savage,"  and  assuredly  nothing 
better  could  be  invented  to  mark  an  artist  brought  up 
in  the  intimate  frequentation  of  ancient  and  modern 
poets,  one  who  is  a  writer  himself,  a  passionate  dilet- 
tante, a  man  of  the  world,  a  charming  talker,  cultivated, 
with  the  keenest  feeling  for  harmony. 

After  the  Revolution  of  1830,  Eugene  Delacroix 
painted  "  Liberty  guiding  the  People  on  the  Barri- 
cades," as  a  replica  of  Auguste  Barbier's  famous 
iambics.  Then  came  the  "  Massacre  of  the  Bishop 
of  Liege,"  "  The  Tigers,"  "  Boissy  d'Anglas,"  "  The 
Battle  of  Nancy,"  the  "  Women  of  Algiers,"  —  a  mar- 

281 


PORTRAITS     OF    THE    DAY 

vellously  varied,  poetic,  passionate,  richly  coloured 
series  of  works  which  I  need  not  detail  at  greater 
length  in  these  few  lines. 

Better  understood  and  better  received,  Eugene  Dela- 
croix was  enabled  to  turn  his  great  and  mighty  talent 
to  the  decoration  of  large  surfaces.  He  was  commis- 
sioned to  paint  the  Throne  Room  and  the  Library  of 
the  Chamber  of  Deputies,  the  cupola  of  the  Peers' 
Library,  the  ceiling  of  the  gallery  of  Apollo,  a  hall  in 
the  Hotel  de  Ville,  and  finally  the  Chapel  of  the  Holy 
Angels  at  Saint-Sulpice.  No  one  better  understood 
mural  and  decorative  painting  than  he  did  ;  he  exhibited 
qualities  of  the  highest  order  in  composition,  and  cov- 
ered the  buildings  intrusted  to  his  brush  with  a  magni- 
ficent vestment  flat  in  tone  like  a  fresco  and  as  velvety 
as  tapestry.  His  great  works  did  not  prevent  his  still 
sending  to  the  Salon  numerous  masterpieces :  "  Saint 
Sebastian,"  "The  Battle  of  Taillebourg,"  "Medea," 
"  The  Convulsionists  of  Tangiers,"  "  A  Jewish  Wed- 
ding in  Morocco,"  "The  Boat  of  Don  Juan,"  "Trajan's 
Justice,"  "  The  Entry  of  the  Crusaders  into  Constanti- 
nople," "The  Rape  of  Rebecca,"  "The  Ascent  of 
Calvary,"  and  many  another  painting,  the  meanest  of 
which  bears  the  unmistakable  mark  of  the  master. 

282 


EUGENE     DELACROIX 

The  Universal  Exposition  in  1855  proved  a  veritable 
triumph  for  Delacroix ;  his  collected  works  appeared  in 
all  their  splendour.  The  most  obstinate  opponents  of 
his  glory  could  not  resist  this  harmonious,  brilliant, 
splendid  collection  of  compositions  so  varied,  so  full 
of  fire  and  genius.  The  artist  received  the  highest 
award,  and  was  appointed  a  commander  in  the  Legion 
of  Honour.  Yet  this  great  master,  whose  colour 
stands  comparison  with  that  of  Titian,  Paul  Veronese, 
Rubens,  and  Rembrandt,  was  not  elected  a  member  of 
the  Institute  before  1858. 

Eugene  Delacroix  was  fortunate  enough  to  be  a  prey 
to  the  fever  of  his  time,  and  to  represent  its  excited 
ideas  with  singular  poetry,  force,  and  intensity.  He 
drew  his  inspiration  from  Shakespeare,  Goethe,  Byron, 
and  Walter  Scott,  but  freely,  like  a  master  who  finds  a 
work  within  a  work,  and  who  remains  the  equal  of 
those  whom  he  translates.  Eckermann  has  recorded 
the  admiring  words  of  the  Weimar  Jove,  when,  at  over 
eighty  years  of  age,  he  looked  over  the  illustrations  to 
"  Faust."  The  German  poet  had  never  understood 
his  work  so  well  as  when  he  saw  it  reproduced  in  the 
lithographs  of  the  young  French  master. 


283 


Portraits    of  the 


HIPPOLYTE   FLANDRIN 

BORN  IN  1809  —  DIED  IN  1864 

HIPPOLYTE  FLANDRIN  kept  constantly 
within  the  high  sphere  of  art,  and  the 
proofs  of  his  genius  are  to  be  sought  for 
on  the  walls  of  churches.  He  was  wholly  worthy  to 
have  sanctuaries  for  studios,  for  never  was  a  more 
religious  inspiration  sustained  by  purer,  juster,  and 
more  elevated  talent  than  his.  The  beloved  and  fer- 
/  vent  disciple  of  an  austere  master,  towards  whom  he 
always  remained  in  the  attitude  of  a  pupil,  although  he 
had  attained  to  glory  for  many  a  year,  he  incessantly 
strove  to  realise  the  ideal  he  had  learned  from  his 
teaching.  He  was  not  satisfied  with  seeking  the 
beautiful,  he  wanted  to  express  holiness;  the  purified 
human  form  was  constantly  used  by  him  to  render  the 
divine  idea.  There  was  in  him  something  of  the  ten- 
der timidity,  the  virginal  delicacy,  and  the  seraphic 
etherealness  of  Fra  Beato  Angelico,  but  the  simplicity 
of  his  sentiment  was  backed  by  deep  knowledge. 

284 


HIPPOLYTE    FLANDRIN 

Practically  and  genuinely  pious,  he  brought  into  reli- 
gious painting  an  element  exceedingly  rare  in  these 
days,  —  faith.  He  believed  sincerely  in  what  he 
painted,  and  did  not  try  to  realise  the  desired  situation 
by  factitious  enthusiasm ;  he  was  in  his  element,  it 
was  the  air  which  he  breathed ;  he  soared  in  it  with 
well  trained  and  confident  wing.  No  modern  painter 
has  come  nearer  the  old  masters  without  falling  into 
archaic  imitation. 

Every  one  remembers  the  sensation  produced  in 
1832  by  his  "Theseus  recognised  by  his  Father  at 
the  Banquet,"  which  won  the  grand  prize  of  Rome, 
and  which  already  proved  that  the  young  painter  pos- 
sessed well  developed  and  promising  talent.  Hippolyte 
Flandrin  painted  during  his  stay  in  Italy,  at  greater  or 
less  intervals,  "  Saint  Clare  healing  the  Blind,"  "  JEs- 
chylus  writing  his  Tragedies,"  "  Dante  in  the  Circle 
of  the  Envious,"  "Jesus  and  Little  Children."  On 
his  return  to  Paris  he  painted  the  "  Saint  Louis  dictat- 
ing his  Orders,"  the  "  Mater  Dolorosa,"  "  Napoleon 
Legislator,"  and  several  other  meritorious  works.  But 
in  spite  of  the  art  which  he  exhibited  in  these,  it  may 
be  affirmed  that  he  had  not  yet  found  his  real  line, — 
mural  and  religious  painting.  The  Chapel  of  Saint 

285 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

John,  in  the  Church  of  Saint-Severin,  is  notable  for 
the  austere  simplicity,  the  masterly  sobriety,  and  the 
neglect  of  empty  effects  which  are  characteristic  of 
painting  associated  with  architecture  and  forming  one 
with  it.  Never,  perhaps,  did  the  artist  draw  more 
admirably  and  firmly.  Unfortunately  the  inferior 
quality  of  the  material  has  damaged  these  noble  com- 
positions in  several  places,  and  before  long  they  will 
have  scaled  away  and  vanished.  The  vast  frieze  of 
Saint-Vincent  de  Paul,  on  which  passes  the  long  pro- 
cession of  all  the  characters  in  the  "  Golden  Legend," 
the  martyred  saints,  the  holy  confessors,  the  blessed 
virgins,  has  won  the  name  of  Christian  Pantheon  by 
the  beauty  of  the  style,  the  rhythm  of  the  groups,  the 
arrangement  of  the  figures.  It  is  indeed  Greek  art 
christianised,  and  which  would  do  honour  to  the  Frieze 
of  the  Parthenon  if  the  building  were  changed  to  a 
church.  Saint-Germain-des-Pres  received  from  Hippo- 
lyte  Flandrin  a  vestment  of  admirable  paintings  which 
cover  the  choir  and  the  Romanesque  nave  in  such  a 
way  that  one  no  longer  regrets  their  ancient  splendour. 
The  indefatigable  artist,  forgetful  of  the  fact  that  his 
labour,  greater  than  human  strength  could  bear,  was 
draining  away  his  life,  painted  also  the  church  of  Saint- 

286 


HIPPOLYTE    FLANDRIN 

Paul  at  Nimes  and  the  apse  of  the  church  of  Ainay  at 
Lyons,  —  his  masterpiece,  say  the  pious  visitors  who 
are  fortunate  enough  to  have  seen  it. 

Let  me  add  that  Hippolyte  Flandrin  was,  like  all 
great  masters,  like  Albert  Diirer,  Holbein,  Titian,  Vel- 
asquez, an  excellent  portrait  painter.  It  is  sufficient 
to  recall,  among  his  more  recent  portraits,  those  of 
Count  Walewski,  Prince  Napoleon,  and  the  Emperor, 
which  are  so  masterly  and  so  admirable  in  likeness. 
Into  the  portraits  of  women  he  introduced  a  modest 
grace,  an  exquisite  distinction,  a  peaceful  serenity,  the 
effect  of  which  was  both  deep  and  irresistible.  No 
one  better  painted  the  portraits  of  honest  women  and 
in  a  more  chaste  and  reserved  fashion.  How  great 
was  the  success  of  that  delightful  portrait  of  a  young 
girl  holding  a  flower  in  her  hand,  called  "The  Young 
Girl  with  the  Carnation,"  just  as  one  speaks  of  Raph- 
ael's madonnas  as  the  "  Madonna  with  the  Veil,"  or 
the  "  Madonna  della  Sedia  !  "  The  gentle  painter  with 
the  angelic  name  would  willingly  sign  that  charming 
canvas  of  the  purest  of  his  admirers  if  he  could  return 
to  life. 


287 


Portraits   of  the   Day 


GAVARNI 

BORN  IN   1801  —  DIED  IN  1866 


THE  ancient  world  still  so  masters  us  from 
the  depth  of  the  ages  that  we  scarcely 
have  the  feeling  of  our  surrounding  civili- 
sation. In  spite  of  the  efforts  of  Paris  and  London, 
Athens  and  Rome  remain  the  capitals  of  thought. 
Every  year  there  issue  from  colleges  thousands  of 
young  Greeks  and  Romans  who  know  nothing  of 
modern  affairs.  More  than  any  one  I  admire  the 
persistent  force  of  thought,  the  eternal  power  of 
beauty  ;  but  is  it  not  strange  that  art  should  reflect 
contemporary  times  so  little  ?  Classical  studies  in- 
spire a  profound  disdain  for  modern  manners,  habits, 
and  customs,  which  are  so  rarely  reproduced  on  monu- 
ments, statues,  bassi-relievi,  medals,  paintings,  furniture, 
and  bronzes  that  future  chroniclers  will  find  it  very 
difficult  to  restore  them  or  to  reproduce  them  in  a 
"Paris  in  the  Days  of  Napoleon  III."  What  idea, 
for  instance,  could  people  have,  in  the  year  3000,  of 

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our  fashionable  ladies,  of  our  famous  beauties,  those 
we  love  and  for  whom  we  have  indulged  in  greater  or 
less  follies,  even  if  the  larger  portion  of  the  works 
of  our  masters  had  not  then  disappeared  ? 

Ingres  is  an  Athenian,  a  pupil  of  Apelles  and 
Phidias,  whose  soul  has  evidently  mistaken  its  age 
and  come  into  the  world  twenty-four  hundred  years 
too  late.  His  paintings  might  be  placed  in  the  Pina- 
cothek  of  the  Propylaea ;  his  portraits,  antique  in  style 
and  of  no  particular  time,  become  eternal.  Delacroix 
scarcely  touches  a  subject  outside  of  history,  the  East, 
or  Shakespeare ;  scarcely  among  his  numerous  works 
does  one  come  across  a  contemporary  type ;  without 
going  back  to  antiquity  like  Ingres,  he  goes  back  to 
the  Venetians  and  the  Flemings,  and  is  modern  in  his 
nervousness  and  passion  only.  He  has  composed  his 
own  microcosm  by  a  sort  of  internal  vision,  and  one 
could  swear  that  he  had  not  once  looked  around  him. 
What  I  say  of  these  two  illustrious  masters,  who  with 
us  represent  the  two  sides  of  art,  is  equally  true  of  all 
the  others.  The  realistic  attempts  made  in  these 
latter  days  seek  an  ugly  ideal  rather  than  the  accurate 
reproduction  of  nature.  The  few  true  types  of  genre 
paintings  are  almost  all  taken  from  the  rustic  classes ; 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

and  it  may  be  said  in  perfect  security  that  neither  the 
men  nor  the  women  of  the  world,  nor  almost  any  of 
the  numerous  members  of  the  society  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  have  left  any  trace  in  the  higher  art  of 
our  day. 

Unquestionably  the  Venus  of  Milo  is  a  wonderful 
statue,  lovingly  polished  by  the  kisses  of  centuries; 
it  has  the  supremest  beauty,  it  is  the  most  perfect 
effort  of  human  genius  to  express  the  ideal,  and  I  my- 
self worship  that  sublime  torso,  the  divinity  of  which 
no  one  can  deny.  But  have  not  Parisian  women  their 
charms  ?  Could  not  sculpture,  if  it  chose  to  do  so, 
discover  the  fair  lines  of  their  elegant  bodies  under  the 
cashmere,  the  fold  of  which  outlines  the  roundest  neck 
and  which  with  its  fringe  kisses  the  heel  of  a  pretty 
shoe  ?  The  drapery  of  Polyhymnia  clings  in  no  more 
supple  manner  than  these  great  Indian  shawls  to  the 
shoulders  and  the  backs  of  well-bred  women.  Henri 
Heine,  who  so  thoroughly  understood  plasticity,  was 
not  mistaken  on  this  point.  He  would  follow  a 
woman  draped  in  her  shawl  as  if  she  were  a  Greek 
goddess  in  a  Parian  chlamyd.  As  for  Balzac,  he  cer- 
tainly preferred  to  all  the  female  deities  .  of  Olympus, 
even  to  Venus  "  adorably  exhausted,"  as  Goethe  says, 

290 


GAVARNI 


Madame  Firmiani,  Madame  de  Beauseant,  Madame  de 
Mortsauf,  the  Duchess  de  Maufrigneuse,  the  Princess 
Cadignan,  Lady  Dudley,  Madame  Marneffe,  even,  per- 
haps. Are  these  lovely  faces,  of  a  rosy  pallor,  framed 
in  by  their  pretty  bonnets  like  angels'  heads  smiling 
in  an  ideal  flower,  with  wavy  or  smooth  hair  which 
Praxiteles  himself  would  not  disturb  if  he  had  to  copy 
them  in  marble,  —  are  they  unworthy  of  being  repro- 
duced in  a  medal  ?  Does  not  the  dressing  of  the  hair 
for  a  ball  afford  an  intelligent  artist  every  possible 
resource,  —  pearls,  flowers,  feathers,  sprays,  nets,  knots, 
bands,  shining  bandeaux,  long  curls,  fluffy  crimps,  heavy 
chignons  twisted  like  the  horn  of  Ammon,  or  negli- 
gently tied  ?  The  dresses,  in  spite  of  the  passing 
exaggeration  of  flounces  and  of  crinoline,  appear,  by 
the  richness  of  the  brocade,  of  the  watered  silk,  of  the 
satin,  and  by  the  frou-frou  of  the  taffeta,  the  transpar- 
ency of  the  lace,  of  the  gauze,  of  the  tulle,  of  the 
tarletan,  the  brilliancy  and  the  suaveness  and  the 
variety  of  the  tones,  to  invite  a  colourist's  brush  and 
to  offer  to  him  a  palette  of  seductive  tints.  But  the 
colourist  does  not  look  at  these  bouquets  of  tone  which 
bloom  at  promenades,  at  parties,  at  receptions,  in  the 
boxes  at  the  theatres  ;  he  prefers  to  dip  his  brush  into 

291 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE     DAY 

the  red  gold  of  Rembrandt,  the  mat  silver  of  Paul 
Veronese,  or  the  blazing  purple  of  Rubens ;  while  the 
sculptor  strips  of  her  garments  on  some  public  square 
a  shivering  nymph,  who  is  ashamed  and  dismayed  at 
finding  herself  nude. 

Leaving  the  Greeks  and  the  Romans  on  one  side, 
Leonardo  da  Vinci,  Raphael,  Andrea  del  Sarto,  Titian 
have  preserved  the  beauties  of  their  day,  eternal  mem- 
ories, which  poets  gaze  at  dreamily  in  the  galleries, 
their  hearts  filled  with  an  irresistible  retrospective 
desire.  There  is  scarce  a  woman  of  mark  of  the  six- 
teenth century,  princess  or  courtesan,  grand  duke's  or 
painter's  mistress,  whose  image  has  not  come  down 
to  us  made  divine  by  art.  Our  day  will  hand  down 
nothing  of  the  sort  to  future  ages.  Our  artists  seem 
to  dread  women.  The  fear  of  falling  into  a  false 
classical  idea  has  urged  them  to  be  vigorous  and  char- 
acteristic and  to  seek  violent  effects ;  few  have  troubled 
themselves  about  modern  beauty.  To  find  traces  of 
it,  the  future  will  have  to  consult  the  portraits  painted 
by  certain  fashionable  artists  who  sought  rather  to 
satisfy  the  taste  of  society  people  than  to  fulfil  the  strict 
requirements  of  art,  —  painters  such  as  Winterhalter, 
Dubuffe,  father  and  son,  Perignon,  and  some  others. 

292 


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GAVARNI 

It  seems  to  me  that  Vidal,  if  he  had  not  let  himself 
drift  into  graceful  and  coquettish  fancies,  could  have 
rendered  the  impression  of  delicate  beauty  and  of 
dainty  elegance  which  a  society  woman  setting  out  for 
a  ball  and  drawing  on  her  gloves  before  her  mirror 
makes  upon  one. 

This  preamble,  which  may  strike  the  reader  as  some- 
what long,  is  intended  to  bring  out  fully  the  originality 
of  Gavarni  and  the  value  of  his  work,  scattered  in 
books  and  albums,  in  collections  and  detached  engrav- 
ings. He  has  no  predecessor  or  rival  in  our  own  day  ; 
he  has  the  not  slight  glory  of  being  frankly,  exclusively, 
absolutely  modern.  Like  Balzac,  with  whom  he  has 
more  than  one  characteristic  in  common,  he  has  also 
produced  his  Human  Comedy,  less  broad  and  less  all- 
embracing  no  doubt,  but  very  complete  in  its  way, 
although  slightly  exaggerated ;  for  while  the  nib  of  the 
pen  runs  on  the  paper,  the  point  of  the  lithographic 
pencil  spreads  on  the  stone.  Gavarni,  an  admirable 
draughtsman  and  an  admirable  anatomist  in  his  own 
way,  is  absolutely  careless  of  the  traditional  sculptural 
forms ;  he  makes  men,  and  not  statues  dressed  up. 
No  one  knows  better  than  he  does  the  wretched  frame 
of  our  bodies  wasted  by  civilisation ;  he  is  acquainted 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

with  the  leanness,  the  wretchedness,  the  bald-headed- 
ness  of  Parisian  dandies ;  their  grotesque  stoutness, 
their  heavy  wrinkles,  their  big  feet,  their  bossy  knees ; 
the  bandy  legs  of  protectors,  of  bankers,  of  so-called 
serious  men  ;  and  he  dresses  up  all  these  people  just 
as  Chevreuil  or  Renard  might  do  it.  With  a  stroke 
of  the  pencil  he  gives  an  overcoat  the  cut  of  a  sack  ; 
he  puts  straps  on  a  pair  of  trousers  ;  he  throws  back 
the  lapels  of  an  overcoat ;  he  opens  or  buttons  a  waist- 
coat ;  he  smooths  or  roughens  the  black  silk  of  a  stove- 
pipe hat,  he  puts  on  gloves,  or  sticks  an  eyeglass  in  the 
eye;  gives  a  curve  to  the  stick  and  makes  the  watch- 
charms  rattle ;  gives  cloth  a  worn  or  well-brushed 
look ;  makes  the  appearance  stylish  or  vulgar,  and 
gives  to  the  elbow,  to  the  outline,  to  the  waist  of  each 
garment  the  characteristic  fold  which  reveals  affecta- 
tion, habit,  vice,  and  which  relates  a  whole  life. 

If  you  wish  to  find  the  Parisian  of  1830  nowadays, 
with  his  costume,  his  coat,  his  attitude  and  physiog- 
nomy, truthful  and  without  caricature,  but  merely 
touched  up  with  that  clever  stroke  which  is  the  very 
spirit  of  the  artist,  glance  through  Gavarni's  work.  It 
will  soon  be  as  full  of  information  as  the  engravings 
of  Gravelot,  Eisen,  Moreau,  and  the  water-colours  of 

294 


GAVARNI 


Baudoin  in  the  last  century.  But  Gavarni's  greatest 
glory  is  not  merely  that  he  has  understood  the  Parisian, 
who  is  considered  impossible  by  contemporary  art  ;  he 
has  understood  the  Parisian  woman,  and  not  only  un- 
derstood but  loved  her,  which  is  the  true  and  only  way 
to  understand.  You  may  be  sure  he  did  not  trouble 
much  about  the  figures  on  the  Parthenon,  the  Venus  of 
Milo,  or  the  Diana  of  Gabies,  and  that  he  discovered  a 
very  satisfying  ideal  in  the  little  perky  face  of  the 
Parisian  woman,  whose  pretty  ugliness  is  itself  grace- 
ful. What  if  the  nose  is  not  absolutely  straight,  the 
cheeks  round  rather  than  oval,  the  mouth  curling  a 
little  at  the  corners,  letting  the  tip  of  the  tongue  show  ; 
the  neck  slender  and  lacking  in  its  plump  flesh  the 
three  folds  of  Aphrodite's  collar,  the  waist  too  much 
drawn  in  by  the  corsets,  making  the  hips  stand  out 
overmuch,  —  what  does  all  that  matter  ?  It  is  not  a 
nymph  of  antiquity  that  he  proposes  to  draw,  but  a 
woman  who  passes  by  and  whom  you  are  following  ; 
he  is  not  making  lithographs  from  the  round,  but 
from  life. 

Long  before  Alexandre  Dumas  the  younger,  Gavarni 
had  sketched  the  Lady  with  the  Camellias,  and  told  in 
his  drawings  and  letterings  the  story  of  the  demi-monde  ; 

295 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

and  how  cleverly,  with  what  easy  dash,  with  what 
perfect  good-breeding !  Mademoiselle  de  Beauper- 
thuis,  M.  Coquardeau,  and  Arthur  have  become  known 
to  everybody ;  they  are  living  characters  in  the  eternal 
comedy.  The  lorette,  thanks  to  Roqueplan  who  chris- 
tened her  and  Gavarni  who  noted  her  changing  appear- 
ance, will  go  down  to  the  most  distant  posterity.  She 
is  neither  the  Greek  hetaira,  nor  the  Roman  courtesan, 
nor  the  impure  woman  of  the  Regency,  nor  the  kept 
woman  of  the  Empire,  nor  the  grisette  of  the  Restora- 
tion ;  she  is  the  special  product  of  our  busy  ways,  the 
free-and-easy  mistress  of  an  age  which  has  not  time  to 
fall  in  love  and  which  is  greatly  bored  at  home.  At 
her  house  you  may  smoke,  stand  on  your  head,  stick 
your  feet  up  on  the  mantelpiece,  say  whatever  you 
please,  even  coarse  pleasantries  and  low  equivoques  ; 
you  are  no  more  restricted  than  among  men,  and  you 
leave  when  you  feel  like  it,  which  is  the  highest  pleas- 
ure. And  then,  after  all,  lorettes  are  jolly  girls.  They 
have  all  been,  more  or  less,  supernumeraries,  actresses, 
music  teachers  ;  they  know  the  slang  of  sport,  of  the 
studio,  of  the  stage ;  they  can  dance  splendidly,  play  a 
waltz,  sing  a  little  bit,  and  roll  a  cigarette  like  a  Span- 
ish smuggler,  —  some  even  can  actually  spell  ;  but 

296 


GAVARNI 


their  chief  talent  is  playing  patience.  As  for  their 
lustral  toilet,  the  bayaderes  of  the  Benares  pagodas  are 
not  more  careful  to  descend  the  white  marble  steps 
which  lead  to  the  Ganges  and  to  wash  within  the 
sacred  river.  As  regards  their  dress,  it  is  only  the 
thorough-bred  Parisian  who  can  tell,  by  some  excess  of 
luxury  or  some  slight  neglect,  that  it  is  not  that  of  a 
woman  of  the  world;  foreigners  are  almost  always 
taken  in,  even  Russians,  who  are  so  very  French. 
Sometimes  they  are  not  dressed  in  just  the  latest 
fashion,  sometimes  in  the  fashion  which  is  going  to  be. 
They  can  wear  anything,  —  watered  silk  and  velvet 
and  feathers  in  their  bonnets,  and  lace  capes,  and  boots 
which  fit  the  foot,  and  men's  cuffs  and  the  cloth  riding- 
habit,  —  everything  except  the  long  shawl  ;  therein  lies 
the  superiority  of  the  honest  woman.  No  Lady  with 
the  Camellias,  no  Marble  Heart,  no  lorette  can  resist  the 
temptation  of  somewhat  stretching  the  shawl  with 
her  elbows  in  order  to  show  off  her  waist  and  to  sug- 
gest very  gently  the  rich  outline  of  the  hips.  Gavarni 
understands  all  these  shades  and  expresses  them  with 
the  quick,  easy  stroke  of  a  pencil  which  is  always  sure 
of  what  it  is  doing.  With  him  we  enter  richly  fur- 
nished boudoirs  full  of  china  vases  and  of  old  Sevres,  in 

297 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

which  flash  Venetian  mirrors  and  candelabra  with 
twisted  arms ;  where  we  see  lying  on  a  divan  the  god- 
dess of  the  place,  half  dressed  in  a  long  wrapper  with  a 
loosened  girdle,  twisting  her  slipper  at  the  end  of  her 
bare  foot,  and  blowing  from  her  rosy  lips  the  smoke  of 
the  papelito^  while  a  female  friend  tells  her  some  funny 
stories  or  a  gentleman  who  is  more  or  less  of  a  rider 
bites  the  tip  of  his  stick  while  churning  over  a  declara- 
tion of  love.  The  furniture,  the  costumes,  the  acces- 
sories, the  fashions,  —  all  are  rendered  with  perfect 
propriety,  with  intimate  modernity,  which  no  one 
possesses  in  the  same  degree.  The  gesture  is  correct, 
accurate,  and  especially  of  the  day  ;  that  is  just  the 
way  we  rise,  sit  down,  hold  our  hat,  put  on  our  gloves, 
bow,  open  and  shut  doors  j  you  can  see  there  is  a  living 
body  under  the  overcoats,  the  cloaks,  the  frock  coats, 
which  is  not  always  the  case  under  the  pseudo-antique 
draperies  of  historical  painters.  For,  as  I  have  said 
before,  Gavarni  is  a  great  anatomist.  The  woman  of 
the  present  day,  not  to  be  found  in  our  paintings,  lives 
in  the  historical  lithographs  of  our  artist,  with  her 
coquettish  mannerism,  her  witty  gracefulness,  her 
dainty  elegance,  her  problematic  but  irresistible  beauty. 
And  all  those  faces  are  so  charming !  How  those  eyes 

298 


GAVARNI 


flash  !  how  delightful  are  those  tip-tilted  noses  !  what 
pretty  dimples  for  Cupids  to  hide  in  !  what  well  shaped 
chins,  softly  rounded  above  a  bow  of  ribbon  !  what 
fresh  cheeks  caressed  by  a  curl  of  hair  !  What  delight- 
ful realities  and  what  charming  shams  under  the  mass 
of  lace,  cambric,  and  taffeta  !  Certainly  there  are 
women  more  beautiful,  nobler,  and  purer,  and  all  this 
is  not  the  supreme  expression  of  feminine  beauty  in 
our  day;  but  Gavarni  has  none  the  less  reproduced 
one  of  the  profiles  of  modern  beauty.  Is  not  Gavarni 
the  painter  and  the  historian  of  that  Carnival  of  Paris, 
which  only  lacks  the  Piazza,  the  Piazzetta,  and  the 
Grand  Canal  to  surpass  the  old-time  Carnival  of  Ven- 
ice ?  While  that  infernal  gallop  —  a  regular  round 
of  the  Sabbath  of  Pleasure  —  is  whirling  to  the  sound 
of  a  tremendous  orchestra,  a  man  stands  there  leaning 
against  a  pillar,  looking,  watching,  noting,  and  to- 
morrow the  debardeuses  in  velvet  trousers  with  lace 
flounces,  broad  silk  girdles  setting  off  their  waists,  fine 
cambric  chemises  with  rosy  transparencies,  and  their 
high  kicking,  will  be  reproduced  upon  the  lithographic 
stone  ;  the  dominoes  will  whisper  under  the  satin  and 
lace  of  the  mask  ;  the  white  pierrots  will  wave  their 
long  sleeves,  flapping  their  wings  like  penguins  ;  the 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

varnished  cardboard  noses  of  serious  men  will  be  seen 
at  full  length ;  the  bells  of  Folly  will  sparkle  and  tin- 
kle ;  the  plumes  will  stand  up  on  the  Roman  helmets ; 
the  necklaces  of  civilised  savages  will  rattle.  Through 
the  dazzling  whirl,  the  misty  light  of  the  chandeliers,  the 
tumult  of  voices  and  orchestra,  the  artist  has  noted 
every  type,  every  turn,  every  face  5  he  inspires  all  the 
masks  with  his  wit,  even  if  they  are  stupid  ;  he  sums 
up  with  a  witty  remark  the  jest  of  the  foyer,  he  trans- 
lates into  a  droll  inscription  the  hoarse  sound  of  the 
rumour ;  and  then  takes  his  pierrettes,  pierrots,  debar- 
deurs,  debardeuses,  dominoes,  and  fashionables  to  the 
Cafe  Anglais  and  the  Maison  Doree  and  intoxicates 
them  with  his  fun,  which  is  more  exhilarating  and 
sparkling  than  champagne. 

Who  is  there  that  is  not  acquainted  with  his  "  Spoiled 
Children,"  and  especially  with  his  "  Spoiled  Parents," 
—  those  tell  everything,  these  take  the  poetry  out  of 
everything,  —  "What  People  Say  and  What  They 
Think,"  «  Masks  and  Faces,"  « Worms  Will  Bite," 
"  Returned  from  Somewhere,"  and  all  the  series,  so 
capitally  drawn,  so  thoroughly  philosophical,  which  one 
is  never  tired  of  looking  over  ?  The  explanations 
added  to  each  drawing  are  often  a  comedy  or  a  vaude- 

300 


*****  ***  **  ***  ***  ******** 

GAVARNI 

ville  in  themselves;  they  are  always  as  good  as  a 
maxim  of  La  Rochefoucauld's.  How  many  a  time 
have  composers  of  vaudevilles  and  reviews  borrowed 
from  these  clever  sayings  !  There  are  very  few  plays 
on  which  Gavarni,  did  he  choose  to  do  so,  could  not 
claim  a  royalty. 

Do  not  suppose  that  because  he  has  drawn  particu- 
larly the  Bohemia  of  pleasure  and  sketched  the  curious 
manners  of  that  world  into  which  the  most  austere 
have  set  foot,  Gavarni  lacks  the  moral  sense.  Glance 
through  the  album  called  "  The  Aged  Lorettes,"  and 
you  will  see  that  his  lithographic  pencil  punishes  vice  as 
much  as  does  Hogarth's  brush.  The  frayed  petticoats, 
the  worn  folds  of  plaid  skirts,  the  checkered  handker- 
chiefs, the  pitiful  shoes  that  let  in  the  water,  the  wan 
faces,  hollow  cheeks,  sunken  eyes  surely  compensate 
for  the  many-flounced  gowns,  the  long  cashmere  shawls 
that  fell  to  the  ground,  the  bonnets  and  feathers,  the 
red-heeled  shoes,  and  all  the  long  vanished  insolent 
luxury.  These  poor  girls  may  be  forgiven  for  having 
been  pretty,  proud,  and  triumphant.  May  the  rice 
powder  rest  lightly  upon  them  ! 

"Thomas  Vireloque,"  although  somewhat  misan- 
thropical, is  good  company  ;  Diogenes,  Rabelais,  and 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

Sancho  Panza  would  nod  approvingly  at  more  than  one 
of  his  aphorisms.  This  type,  created  by  Gavarni,  will 
certainly  live. 

In  this  rapid  sketch  I  have  not  even  endeavoured  to 
describe  the  multiform  work  of  the  master;  I  have 
simply  tried  to  mark  the  chief  features  of  that  artistic 
physiognomy,  so  original,  so  living,  so  modern,  which 
criticism,  too  much  occupied  with  supposedly  serious 
talents,  has  not  studied  with  the  attention  which  it 
certainly  deserved. 

The  name  which  Gavarni  made  illustrious  was  not 
his  own;  he  was  really  called  Sulpice-Paul  Chevallier, 
and  he  had  borrowed  from  one  of  his  first  publications 
that  graceful  pseudonym  which  so  thoroughly  suited 
his  light,  elegant,  and  free  talent.  The  early  part  of 
Gavarni's  career  was  hard,  and  he  had  turned  thirty 
before  he  managed  to  make  his  mark.  I  knew  him 
about  that  time.  He  was  a  handsome  young  fellow  with 
abundant  fair,  curly  hair,  very  careful  in  his  dress,  very 
fashionable  in  his  attire,  somewhat  English  in  his  accu- 
rate way  of  dressing,  and  having  in  the  highest  degree 
the  feeling  of  modern  elegance.  He  never  worked  but 
in  a  black  velvet  jacket,  well-cut  trousers  with  straps, 

302 


GAVARNI 


a  fine  cambric  shirt  with  frill,  and  patent-leather  shoes 
with  red  heels,  —  exactly  as  he  may  be  seen  in  his 
portrait  drawn  by  himself,  seen  from  the  back,  on  the 
cover  of  one  of  Hetzel's  illustrated  publications.  He 
looked  rather  like  a  dandy  who  dabbled  in  art  than 
like  an  artist,  in  the  somewhat  vague  meaning  of 
that  word  ;  and  yet  what  an  obstinate,  what  an  inces- 
sant, what  a  fertile  worker  he  was  !  An  immense 
building  might  be  erected  with  the  lithographic  stones 
upon  which  he  has  drawn. 

It  may  be  affirmed  that  Gavarni,  although  very  well 
known,  very  popular,  and  even  famous,  was  not  fully 
appreciated,  any  more  than  Daumier,  Raffet,  and  Gus- 
tave  Dore,  brilliant  as  is  the  reputation  of  the  latter. 
The  French  like  sterling  talents,  and  are  strangely 
mistrustful  of  fertility.  How  is  it  possible  to  believe 
in  the  merit  of  multiplied  works  which  you  come 
across  every  day  either  in  a  newspaper  or  in  a  maga- 
zine, especially  when  they  are  living,  clever,  drawn 
from  our  very  manners,  full  of  fire,  go,  and  dash,  origi- 
nal in  thought,  conception,  and  execution,  owing  noth- 
ing to  antiquity,  expressing  our  loves,  our  aversions, 
our  tastes,  our  caprices,  our  peculiarities,  showing  the 
clothes  in  which  we  dress,  the  types  of  gracefulness 

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and  of  coquetry  which  please  us,  and  the  very  sur- 
roundings amid  which  our  lives  are  passed  ?  All  that 
does  not  seem  serious,  and  a  man  who  would  admire  a 
naked  Ajax,  a  Theseus,  a  Philoctetes,  would  willingly 
look  down  upon  Gavarni's  Parisians. 

No  one  knew  better  than  Gavarni  how  to  draw  a 
black  coat  and  a  modern  body,  and  that  is  not  an  easy 
matter.  Just  ask  the  painters  of  high  life.  Humann 
admired  him.  Under  that  coat  the  artist  with  three 
strokes  of  his  pencil  could  put  a  human  armature  with 
accurate  joints,  easy  movements,  —  a  living  being,  in  a 
word,  capable  of  turning  around,  of  coming,  of  going. 
Very  often  Delacroix  looked  with  a  thoughtful  glance 
at  these  apparently  trivial  drawings  that  were  so  thor- 
oughly true.  He  was  surprised  at  the  perfect  posing 
of  the  figures,  the  cohesion  of  the  limbs,  at  the  atti- 
tudes so  cleanly  drawn,  at  the  simple  and  natural 
mimicry.  Every  year  made  Gavarni's  drawing  easier, 
freer,  and  broader;  neither  the  pencil  nor  the  litho- 
graphic stone  seemed  to  present  any  obstacles  to  him ; 
he  did  with  them  as  he  pleased. 

In  that  nature  of  his,  which  was  so  peculiarly  origi- 
nal, there  was,  besides  the  artist  and  the  philosopher, 
the  writer,  who  in  a  couple  of  lines  at  the  foot  of  his 

3°4 


GAVARNI 


drawings,  wrote  more  comedies,  vaudevilles,  and  studies 
of  manners  than  all  the  other  authors  of  our  time 
taken  together.  Gavarni  was  the  wit-maker  of  his 
day  ;  most  of  the  witticisms  of  these  latter  years  have 
come  from  him;  his  influence,  though  unconfessed, 
has  been  very  great.  He  invented  a  more  amusing, 
more  fantastic,  and  more  picturesque  carnival  than  the 
ancient  carnival  of  Venice.  His  types  are  creations 
copied  by  reality,  which  later  imitated  his  drawings.  It 
is  he  who  imparted  the  life  of  art  to  Bohemians,  stu- 
dents, painters,  lorettes  ;  he  revealed  the  treacheries  of 
women,  the  terrible  artlessness  of  children,  what  people 
say  and  what  they  think,  not  like  a  morose  preacher, 
after  the  fashion  of  Hogarth,  but  like  an  indulgent 
moralist  who  is  acquainted  with  human  frailty  and  is 
forgiving  to  it. 

And  yet  it  would  be  a  great  mistake  to  suppose  that 
Gavarni  is  merely  graceful,  witty,  and  elegant.  His 
u  Aged  Lorettes,"  with  their  comically  gloomy  legends, 
are  positively  terrible.  Thomas  Vireloque,  the  tramp 
whose  garments  are  torn  by  every  bramble,  casts  with 
his  one  eye  as  clear,  as  deep,  as  single  a  glance  upon  life 
and  humanity  as  ever  did  Rabelais,  Swift,  or  Voltaire. 

Gavarni    brought    back    terrifying   pictures,   sinister 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

phantoms,  more  hideous  and  more  painful  than  the 
visions  of  a  nightmare,  from  the  poor  wretches  he 
observed  in  Saint  Giles  during  his  stay  in  London. 

His  way  of  working  was  peculiar.  He  used  to 
begin  trifling  on  the  stone  without  having  any  settled 
subject  or  plan.  Little  by  little  the  figures  began  to 
show,  assumed  the  appearance  of  life,  and  were  pro- 
vided with  features  ;  they  went  and  came,  busy  at 
something  or  another.  Gavarni  listened  to  them,  tried 
to  make  out  what  they  were  saying,  just  as  when  you 
see  a  stranger  walking  and  gesticulating  along  the 
boulevard.  Then,  when  he  had  got  the  correct  legend, 
he  wrote,  or  rather,  dictated  it. 

For  a  few  years  past  Gavarni,  although  still  as  much 
sought  after,  had  somewhat  given  up  drawing.  His 
mind,  always  fond  of  exact  sciences,  was  turning 
towards  higher  mathematics,  and  he  gave  himself  up 
to  the  solution  of  difficult  problems  for  which  he  found 
new  and  curious  solutions.  He  took  great  pleasure  in 
that  work  in  which  numbers  grow  infinitely  and  pro- 
duce most  amazing  combinations.  He  was  not  one 
of  those  chimerical  seekers  after  the  squaring  of  the 
circle  or  perpetual  motion,  but  a  sound  mathematician 
prized  by  the  Institute. 

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GAVARNI 


He  died  in  that  Auteuil  villa  in  which  I  was  his 
neighbour  some  twenty  years  ago,  and  the  garden  of 
which,  since  then  cut  up  by  the  building  of  the  railway, 
contained  only  evergreen  trees,  cedars,  pines,  hemlocks, 
thuyas,  box,  holly,  green  oaks,  ivy,  and  firs,  so  that  the 
sombre  verdure  made  it  look  like  a  cemetery  garden. 
It  appears  that  that  collection  of  evergreens  was  unri- 
valled, and  the  artist,  who  was  also  a  horticulturist, 
prized  it  very  highly. 


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Portraits    of  the    Day 


DAVID    D'ANGERS 

BORN  IN   1789  —  DIED  in  1856 


IT  is  possible  to  collect  in  one's  library  all  the 
works  of  one's  favourite  poet  or  author,  for 
printing  enables  a  sufficient  number  of  copies  to 
be  struck  off  to  satisfy  all  admirers.  But  an  artist's 
statues  and  paintings,  necessarily  unique,  are  scat- 
tered, adorn  distant  museums,  are  in  places  which 
often  one  knows  not  of,  are  buried  within  some 
inaccessible  collection,  are  sometimes  destroyed  by 
fire,  by  the  action  of  time,  by  carelessness,  by  enmity, 
or  in  some  other  way.  However  careful  one  may 
be  in  following  the  career  of  a  sculptor  or  a  painter, 
some  of  his  work  escapes  attention,  and  although 
I  thought  that  I  knew  David  d'Angers',  I  was 
surprised,  on  turning  over  the  engravings  of  his 
works,  at  the  great  number  of  things  new  to  me 
which  it  contained;  for  David  was  a  hard  worker. 
It  is  amazing  how  much  clay  he  kneaded,  how  much 
marble  he  carved,  how  much  bronze  he  moulded, 

308 


DAVID    DANGERS 


from  1810  to  1855  ;  his  statues  are  almost  numerous 
enough  to  form  a  people. 

In  1815  David  was  at  Rome  as  a  prize  winner. 
His  "Dying  Orthryadas"  had  won  him  a  second 
prize,  and  his  bas-relief  of  "  The  Death  of  Epaminon- 
das"  was  the  means  of  sending  him  to  the  Eternal 
City.  In  spite  of  its  necessarily  classic  style,  the 
"  Orthryadas  "  already  exhibits  traces  of  originality, 
and  the  carefully  studied  forms  prove  David's  desire  for 
truth.  The  bas-relief  of  the  "  Death  of  Epaminondas  " 
has  more  life  than  is  usually  seen  in  that  class  of  com- 
positions, in  which  the  student,  in  order  to  render  his 
severe  judges  favourable  to  himself,  seeks  correctness 
more  than  any  other  merit. 

The  "Nereid  bearing  the  Helmet  of  Achilles,"  a 
marble  bas-relief,  exhibits  true  Greek  grace  in  the 
figure.  This  piece  of  work,  which  was  sent  from 
Rome  and  which  is  dated  1815,  suggests  that  young 
David  (then  twenty-three  years  of  age)  was  feeling  the 
influence  of  antiquity  exclusively.  The  masterpieces 
of  Greek  and  Roman  statuary  must  have  impressed 
him  deeply  and  have  carried  the  day  over  his  own  ten- 
dencies. The  Nereid,  seen  from  behind  lying  on  a 
dolphin,  raises  with  one  hand  the  helmet  of  Achilles, 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

and  with  the  other  holds  the  end  of  a  floating  drapery, 
the  folds  of  which  are  broken  and  fringed  like  the  foam 
curl  of  a  wave.  The  line,  which,  springing  from  the 
bent  waist,  swells  with  the  hip  and  is  prolonged  to  the 
toe,  is  lovely  in  its  elegance.  As  a  companion  to  this 
figure,  David  blocked  out  a  "  Nereid  bearing  the  Shield 
of  Achilles,"  but  this  work  was  not  finished,  which  is 
a  pity.  The  pose  is  excellent.  The  nymph,  bestriding 
a  marine  monster,  is  seen  full  face  ;  her  arms  hold  the 
buckler  most  gracefully,  and  her  crossed  feet  enable  her 
to  retain  her  equilibrium  upon  the  back  of  her  steed. 

The  "Shepherd,"  sent  from  Rome  in  1817,  is  a 
small  figure,  quite  artless,  of  juvenile  gracility  which 
somewhat  recalls  the  manner  of  Donatello,  but  the 
master's  individual  feeling  does  not  yet  manifest  itself; 
for  David  was  later  a  Romanticist  sculptor  within  the 
limits  of  that  severe  and  accurate  art  of  his,  the  true 
environment  of  which  was  antiquity  with  its  anthropo- 
morphous polytheism.  As  soon  as  David  had  mas- 
tered his  tools  and  the  secrets  of  his  art,  as  soon  as  he 
was  able  to  express  his  idea  freely,  he  bethought  him- 
self more  of  character  than  of  beauty.  The  deep 
rhythm  of  Greek  line  appeared  to  him  cold  and  even 
conventional ;  antique  heads,  with  their  serene  placid- 

310 


DAVID    D'ANGERS 


ity,  struck  him  as  almost  always  wanting  in  expression, 
at  least  to  eyes  accustomed  to  the  complications  of 
modern  life.  More  than  any  other  sculptor  he  paid 
attention  to  the  human  face.  For  sculptors  in  general, 
the  head  is  merely  a  detail  of  the  body  ;  the  torso  is 
quite  as  important,  if  not  more  so  ;  unconsciously  pa- 
gan, they  do  not  pay  sufficient  attention  to  that  trans- 
parent mask  on  which  the  soul  leaves  a  visible  trace. 

David  d'Angers  indulged  this  interest  of  his  greatly  ; 
he  constantly  sought  the  opportunity  to  reproduce  in 
the  shape  of  busts  or  medals  contemporary  celebrities. 
He  went  to  Weimar  to  make  a  bust  of  Goethe  ;  he 
made  one  of  Chateaubriand,  of  Beranger,  of  Lamen- 
nais,  of  Arago,  of  Balzac.  He  delighted  in  noting 
how  genius  showed  in  the  external  modelling  as  by  a 
sort  of  hammered  work,  marked  the  skull  with  bumps 
and  the  brow  with  protuberances,  kneaded,  moulded, 
and  wrinkled  the  cheeks.  In  him  the  physiogno- 
mist and  the  phrenologist  mingled  with  the  sculptor  in 
rather  excessive  proportions,  for  he  often  exaggerated 
beyond  the  limits  of  possibility  the  organs  of  some 
faculty  which  he  believed  he  had  discovered  in  his 
model,  or  which  really  existed  in  it.  His  monumental 
busts  are  nevertheless  superb  pieces  of  work,  and  will 

311 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

go  down  to  posterity  as  final  and  accepted  types  of  the 
celebrities  they  represent.  It  is  difficult  to  imagine 
Goethe  in  any  form  other  than  that  in  which  he  is 
represented  by  David  d'Angers. 

The  profiles  which  he  moulded  with  swift  and  sure 
touch,  with  deep  feeling  for  physiognomy,  will  form  a 
complete  collection  of  medals  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, for  almost  all  the  various  classes  of  celebrities  are 
represented  in  it  by  their  leaders.  This  forms  not  the 
least  interesting  part  of  David  d'Angers'  work.  His 
medals,  in  their  accurate,  delicate  modelling,  are  not  in 
the  least  worked  out  from  the  point  of  view  of  the 
ancients.  The  sculptor  did  not  try  to  make  his  con- 
temporaries into  Syracusan  medals,  he  takes  them  as 
they  are,  with  their  hair  long  or  short,  bristling  or 
smooth,  bald-headed,  moustached,  bewhiskered,  with 
chins  shaven,  with  coat,  collar,  and  cravat  if  necessary, 
and  in  this  respect  he  is  thoroughly  modern. 

Few  sculptors  have  shared  as  much  in  the  intel- 
lectual movements  of  their  day.  Not  that  David 
d'Angers  was  a  literary  man,  but  he  was  full  of  ideas, 
and  he  thought  it  was  the  duty  of  the  artist  to  represent 
them,  or  at  least  to  have  them  reflected  in  his  work. 
He  therefore  lived  intimately  with  poets,  and  more 

312 


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DAVID    D'ANGERS 

than  one  magnificent  ode  testifies  to  the  noble  ex- 
changes of  admiration  which  were  so  frequent  in  the 
heyday  of  Romanticism ;  his  marble  was  often  re- 
turned to  him  in  the  shape  of  verse  no  less  solid  and 
lasting.  For  my  part,  I  believe  that  the  marble  of 
Paros  and  Corinth  should  express  beauty  first  and  fore- 
most, and  not  a  political  or  a  philosophical  idea,  and  1 
therefore  regret  the  often  useless  trouble  which  David 
d'Angers  took  to  make  his  art  fit  in  with  his  system. 
Happily  in  his  work  the  number  of  statues  which  he 
forgot  to  so  fit  in  is  large.  "  The  Maiden  by  the 
Tomb  of  Marco  Botzaris,"  writing  with  her  finger 
in  the  dust  the  name  of  the  illustrious  dead,  comes 
within  the  compass  of  pure  art,  in  spite  of  the  Philhel- 
lenic preoccupations  of  the  time.  The  lovely  body, 
in  its  chaste  nudity,  has  all  the  gracefulness  of  a 
nymph,  and  a  truthfulness  and  a  morbidexza  which 
transform  the  marble  into  flesh.  "  The  Young  Drum- 
mer Barra"  has  nothing  left  of  his  uniform  save  the 
drumstick  which  he  still  holds  with  the  dying  hand, 
and  exhibits  a  delicate  torso  somewhat  slender  in  form, 
as  delicate  and  as  pure  as  that  of  Hyacinth  fallen  under 
the  blow  dealt  by  Apollo.  "The  Child  with  the 
Bunch  of  Grapes,"  celebrated  by  Sainte-Beuve  in  ex- 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

quisite  verse  on  an  old  rhythm  of  Ronsard's,  is  worthy 
of  the  rimes  it  has  inspired.  It  is  a  piece  of  work 
worthy  of  antiquity.  "Philopoemen  drawing  the  Ar- 
row from  his  Wound "  represents,  in  spite  of  the 
Greek  subject,  a  wholly  modern  body,  but  so  carefully 
studied,  so  absolutely  true,  that  one  does  not  regret  the 
purer  and  fuller  forms  which  an  Athenian  sculptor 
would  doubtless  have  given  us.  That  excellent  piece 
of  work  does  the  greatest  honour  to  David,  and  counts 
among  the  best  produced  by  artists  in  our  day. 

There  was  a  grave  question,  not  yet  settled,  which 
then  excited  studios  and  literary  circles  :  Should  con- 
temporary celebrities  be  represented  in  their  modern 
dress,  or  in  a  state  of  apotheosis  and  of  ideal  nudity  as 
the  sculptors  of  antiquity  represented  their  contem- 
poraries ?  The  Romanticists,  through  a  sort  of  reac- 
tion against  pseudo-classicism,  were  in  favour  of  the 
absolute  reproduction  of  the  costume.  They  wanted 
to  have  the  Emperor  wear  his  three-cornered  hat  and 
his  gray  riding-coat,  and  not  the  pallium  of  the  Roman 
Caesars.  David  d' Angers  did  not  quite  make  up  his 
mind  one  way  or  the  other;  although  his  liking  for 
realism  inclined  him  to  accurate  reproduction  of  cos- 
tume, his  sculptor's  instinct  drew  him  towards  the  nude, 


DAVID    DANGERS 


without  which  there  can  be  no  real  sculpture  ;  so  he 
represents  Corneille  in  the  costume  of  the  day,  some- 
what modified  and  wearing  a  cloak,  and  on  the  other 
hand,  Racine  nude  and  wearing  a  Greek  chlamyd  the 
folds  of  which  he  brings  back  over  his  breast  like  an 
Athenian  tragic  poet.  General  Foy  has  a  cloak  only 
in  the  figure  which  crowns  his  monument,  but  he  is 
dressed  in  the  bas-relief  which  represents  him  amid 
his  illustrious  contemporaries. 

This  apparent  contradiction  can  be  explained.  The 
bas-relief  represents  the  man  such  as  he  was  ;  in  the 
statue  he  is  transformed,  deified  to  a  certain  extent,  for 
it  represents  the  man's  genius.  In  his  remarkable 
Pantheon  pediment,  David  mingles  allegorical  and 
realistic  figures  ;  the  former  are  nude  or  draped,  the 
latter  wear  the  costume  of  their  day.  The  statue 
of  Talma  might  be  that  of  Roscius,  but  an  actor  has 
no  proper  costume  and  it  is  permissible  to  give  to 
the  tragedian  of  modern  days  the  attitude  and  nudity 
of  antiquity.  Later,  however,  urged  no  doubt  by 
literary  reasons,  David  d'  Angers  resolutely  gave  to 
his  statues  of  illustrious  personages  the  costume  of 
the  time  in  which  they  lived,  and  being  unable  to  ex- 
hibit his  profound  knowledge  of  anatomy  under  the 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

more  or  less  eccentric  forms  of  dress,  he  concentrated 
his  whole  talent  on  the  heads  and  faces. 

He  added  to  the  statue  of  Bernardin  de  Saint-Pierre 
a  delightful  group  of  Paul  and  Virginia  asleep  under 
a  tropical  plant,  their  childish  arms  interlaced.  He 
carved  superb  Victories  in  the  panels  of  the  Triumphal 
Arch  at  Marseilles ;  great  allegorical  figures  of  robust 
and  masterly  port;  he  placed  beautiful  women  by  the 
CEil-de-bceuf  of  the  Louvre ;  and  every  time  that  an 
opportunity  occurred  to  place  a  Mourning  Genius  or  a 
Weeping  Virtue  upon  a  tomb,  he  seized  upon  it.  But 
in  spite  of  the  number  of  such  examples,  the  most 
remarkable  part  of  his  work  is  the  representation  of 
illustrious  men,  the  glorifying  of  human  genius  ;  Cor- 
neille,  Racine,  Goethe,  Humboldt,  Cuvier,  Byron, 
Rossini,  Alfred  de  Musset,  are  represented  by  statues, 
busts,  or  medals.  I  have  merely  mentioned  a  few 
names  here  and  there;  warriors  and  statesmen  also 
have  their  place  in  this  sculptured  Pantheon  which 
David  d'Angers  made  of  his  own  accord,  often  for 
marble  or  bronze,  very  often  for  nothing,  moved  by 
admiration,  enthusiasm,  or  sympathy. 

His  last  work  was  the  statue  of  Arago  lying  in  eter- 
nal rest  on  the  marble  of  the  tomb.  He  was  faithful 

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DAVID    DANGERS 


to  the  mission  of  his  whole  life,  which  was  to  fix  the 
features  of  the  man  of  genius  and  to  bestow  upon  him 
the  longest  eternity  which  art  grants,  that  of  sculp- 
ture. Thus  it  is  that  the  name  of  David  d'  Angers  is 
linked  with  the  names  of  all  the  famous  men  who  fill 
the  first  half  of  this  century,  and  is  inscribed  upon  their 
august  images.  This  was  his  individual,  his  distinctive 
character. 


31? 


Portraits  of  the   D  ay 


MADEMOISELLE    FANNY    ELSSLER 

THE  newspapers  trouble  themselves  only  about 
the  talent  and  the  art   of  actresses;    their 
beauty  is    never    analysed,  they  are  never 
looked  at  from  a  purely  plastic  point  of  view.     Occa- 
sionally, it  is  true,  their  gracefulness,  their  daintiness, 
is  mentioned,  but  that  is  all. 

Yet  an  actress  is  a  statue  or  a  picture  which  poses 
before  you,  and  she  may  be  criticised  safely;  she  may 
be  reproached  with  her  ugliness,  just  as  a  painter  would 
be  reproached  for  violating  the  rules  of  drawing  (the 
question  of  feeling  pity  for  human  defects  is  out  of 
place  here)  ;  her  charms  may  be  praised  with  the  same 
indifference  as  a  sculptor  exhibits  who,  in  the  presence 
of  a  statue  says,  "  That  is  a  fine  shoulder,  or  a  well- 
turned  arm." 

No  newspaper  dwells  on  this  important  point,  so 
that  the  reputation  of  pretty  actresses  is  the  work  of 
chance,  and  usually  is  far  from  being  deserved.  Be- 
sides, many  of  these  reputations  for  beauty  have  lasted 

318 


Cop-cj  right  190  I.  by  George  DSproul 


MADEMOISELLE    FANNY    ELSSLER 

for  more  than  a  half-century,  which  is  in  truth  too 
long. 

Numberless  heroic  generals,  charming  functionaries 
of  the  Empire  and  no  less  delightful  provincials,  even 
thorough-bred  Parisians,  yet  admire  the  traditional  and 
mythological  bloom  of  Mademoiselle  Mars,  the  inimi- 
table Celimene,  a  bloom  which  goes  back  to  fabulous 
times.  In  general,  handsome  actresses  are  fairly  ugly, 
—  it  is  just  to  them  to  say  so,  —  and  if  they  did  not 
have  the  stage  for  a  pedestal,  no  one  would  pay  any 
attention  to  them ;  they  would  be  classed  with  ordinary 
women  and  with  honest  women  who  themselves  have 
no  other  merit  than  that  they  are  not  men,  as  is  easily 
seen  when  they  abandon  the  dress  of  their  sex  to  put 
on  ours. 

All  this  has  no  reference  to  Mademoiselle  Fanny 
Elssler,  who  is  in  the  flower  of  her  youth  and  her 
beauty,  and  has  the  advantage  of  not  having  been 
admired  by  our  grandfathers.  She  is  tall,  supple,  and 
well  built;  she  has  slender  wrists  and  well-turned 
ankles.  Her  legs,  shapely  and  clean,  recall  the  vigor- 
ous slenderness  of  the  legs  of  Diana,  the  virgin  hun- 
tress ;  the  kneecap  is  fair,  and  stands  out  well,  —  the 
whole  knee  is  irreproachable.  Her  legs  differ  greatly 

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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

from  those  of  most  dancers,  whose  whole  body  seems 
to  have  settled  down  within  the  stockings  ;  they  are 
not  legs  like  those  of  a  parish  beadle  or  a  knave  of 
clubs,  which  excite  the  enthusiasm  of  Anacreontic  old 
men  in  the  orchestra  stalls  and  make  them  polish  care- 
fully the  lenses  of  their  glasses,  but  two  beautiful  legs 
of  antique  statues,  worthy  to  be  moulded  and  lovingly 
studied.  I  hope  I  may  be  forgiven  for  talking  so  much 
about  legs,  but  I  am  writing  about  a  dancer. 

Here  is  another  point  worthy  of  praise  :  Mademoi- 
selle Elssler  has  rounded,  well-turned  arms  ;  the  bones 
do  not  show  at  the  elbow  ;  they  resemble  in  no  way 
the  wretched  arms  of  her  companions,  the  dreadful 
leanness  of  which  makes  them  look  like  lobsters'  claws. 

Her  figure  is  pretty  well  rounded,  and  —  which  is 
rare  among  dancers,  to  whom  the  double  hills  and  the 
snowy  mounts  so  often  sung  by  schoolboys  and  song 
writers  appear  to  be  totally  unknown  —  one  does  not 
see  moving  on  her  back  those  two  bony  squares  which 
look  like  the  roots  of  wings  which  have  been  torn  out. 

As  for  the  shape  of  her  head,  I  confess  it  does  not 
appear  to  me  as  graceful  as  people  describe  it.  Made- 
moiselle Elssler  has  beautiful  hair  which  falls  on  either 
side  of  her  temples,  shining  and  lustrous  like  a  bird's 

320 


MADEMOISELLE    FANNY    ELSSLER 

wing.  The  dark  colour  of  her  hair  shows  somewhat 
too  Southern  against  the  distinctively  German  character 
of  her  face.  That  sort  of  hair  does  not  properly  belong 
to  such  a  head  and  such  a  body.  This  peculiarity 
troubles  the  eye  and  disturbs  the  harmony  of  the  whole. 
Her  eyes,  very  dark,  which  look  like  two  little  jet  stars 
upon  a  crystal  sky,  are  entirely  different  from  the  nose, 
which  is  wholly  German  as  well  as  the  brow.  Made- 
moiselle Elssler  has  been  called  a  Spaniard  of  the 
North,  and  this  was  intended  as  a  compliment.  It 
is  her  defect.  She  is  German  by  her  smile,  the  white- 
ness of  her  skin,  the  outline  of  her  face,  the  placidity 
of  her  brow  ;  she  is  Spanish  by  her  hair,  her  small  feet, 
her  slender,  delicate  hands,  the  somewhat  bold  turn  of 
her  waist.  Two  different  natures  and  two  different 
temperaments  struggle  in  her ;  her  beauty  would  be 
improved  if  one  of  the  types  prevailed.  She  is  pretty, 
but  she  lacks  distinctive  racial  traits  ;  she  is  neither 
quite  Spanish  nor  quite  German,  and  the  same  inde- 
cision is  to  be  noticed  in  her  sexual  characteristics. 
Her  hips  are  not  much  developed,  her  bosom  does 
not  exceed  that  of  the  Hermaphrodite  of  antiquity ; 
just  as  she  is  a  very  charming  woman,  she  would  be 
the  loveliest  boy  possible. 

321 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

I  shall  finish  this  portrait  with  a  little  advice.  Made- 
moiselle Elssler's  smile  does  not  show  often  enough. 
Sometimes  it  is  forced  and  strained  ;  it  shows  the  gums 
too  much.  In  certain  attitudes,  when  she  bends,  the 
lines  of  her  face  do  not  show  properly,  the  eyebrows 
become  thin,  the  corners  of  the  mouth  are  turned  up, 
and  the  nose  looks  pointed,  which  gives  her  face  a  dis- 
agreeable expression  of  sly  malice.  Mademoiselle 
Elssler  should  also  dress  her  hair  lower ;  if  she  did  so, 
she  would  break  the  line  of  the  shoulders  and  neck, 
which  is  too  square.  I  also  advise  her  to  dye  the  ends 
of  her  pretty,  slender  fingers  a  less  brilliant  rose.  It  is 
a  needless  addition. 


322 


Portraits   of  the   D  ay 


MADEMOISELLE    GEORGES 

MADEMOISELLE  GEORGES  has  been 
beautiful  for  a  very  long  time,  and  one 
might  say  of  her  what  the  peasant  said  of 
Aristides,  "  I  banish  you  because  I  am  tired  of  hearing 
you  called  just."  I  shall  not  do  like  that  worthy 
Greek  individual,  although  evidently  it  is  more  difficult 
to  be  always  beautiful  than  to  be  always  just;  but 
Mademoiselle  Georges  seems  to  have  solved  that  im- 
portant problem.  Years  pass  over  her  marble  face 
without  in  the  least  modifying  the  purity  of  her  profile, 
that  of  a  Greek  Melpomene.  Her  state  of  preserva- 
tion is  far  more  miraculous  than  that  of  Mademoiselle 
Mars,  who  is  not  in  the  slightest  degree  well  preserved, 
and  who  can  cause  any  illusion  in  her  lovers'  parts  only 
to  army  contractors  of  the  time  of  the  Republic  and  to 
generals  of  the  Empire. 

But  in  spite  of  the  excessive  number  of  lustres 
which  she  counts,  Mademoiselle  Georges  is  really 
beautiful,  and  very  beautiful.  She  is  so  like  a  Syra- 

323 


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PORTRAITS    OF    THE     DAY 

cusan  medal  or  an  Isis  on  an  Eginetic  bas-relief  that 
one  might  well  mistake  her  for  them.  The  rich  eye- 
brows, drawn  with  incomparable  purity  and  delicacy, 
stretch  over  the  black  eyes  full  of  fire  and  tragic 
flashes;  the  nose,  thin  and  straight,  cut  by  a  finely 
dilated  nostril,  runs  into  the  brow  by  a  line  magnificent 
in  its  simplicity  ;  the  mouth  is  strong,  arched  at  the 
corners,  splendidly  disdainful  like  that  of  an  avenging 
Nemesis  which  awaits  the  moment  of  letting  slip  her 
brazen-clawed  lion.  Yet  her  mouth  has  the  loveliest 
smile,  which  blooms  with  imperial  grace,  and  one 
would  never  dream,  when  she  expresses  tender  pas- 
sions, that  she  has  just  hurled  an  antique  imprecation 
or  a  modern  anathema. 

Her  chin,  which  exhibits  strength  and  resolution,  is 
firmly  turned,  and  ends  that  majestic  contour  of  her  pro- 
file, which  is  more  that  of  a  goddess  than  of  a  woman. 

Like  all  the  beautiful  women  of  the  Pagan  cycle, 
Mademoiselle  Georges  has  a  full,  broad  brow,  swelling 
somewhat  at  the  temples,  but  not  very  lofty,  very  sim- 
ilar to  that  of  the  Venus  of  Milo ;  a  brow  full  of 
will,  voluptuousness,  and  power,  which  suits  equally 
Clytemnestra  and  Messalina. 

A  remarkable  peculiarity  of  Mademoiselle  Georges' 

324 


MADEMOISELLE    GEORGES 

neck  is  that  instead  of  rounding  inward  from  the  side 
of  the  shoulders,  it  forms  a  full  contour  which  unites 
the  shoulders  and  the  back  of  the  head  without  any 
sinuosity,  a  mark  of  the  athletic  temperament  which 
is  shown  in  the  highest  degree  in  the  Farnese  Hercules. 
The  upper  part  of  the  arm  is  almost  formidable 
through  the  strength  of  the  muscles  and  the  vigour 
of  the  contour.  One  of  her  bracelets  would  make 
a  girdle  for  a  woman  of  ordinary  size,  but  her  arms 
are  very  white,  beautifully  shaped,  and  end  in  a  wrist 
childlike  in  its  delicacy  and  in  its  slenderness,  and 
pretty  hands  dimpled  all  over,  regular  royal  hands 
made  to  bear  the  sceptre  and  to  clutch  the  handle  of  a 
dagger  of  ^Eschylus  or  Euripides. 

Mademoiselle  Georges  seems  to  belong  to  a  mighty 
vanished  race.  She  amazes  as  much  as  she  charms; 
she  seems  a  Titan  woman,  a  Cybele,  mother  of  gods 
and  of  men,  with  her  crown  of  crenelated  towers. 
Her  build  has  something  cyclopaean  and  pelasgic  ;  one 
feels  on  seeing  her  that  she  remains  standing  like  a 
granite  column,  a  witness  to  a  bygone  generation,  and 
that  she  is  the  last  representative  of  the  epic  and 
superhuman  type.  She  is  an  admirable  statue,  fit  to 
be  placed  upon  the  tomb  of  tragedy  buried  forever. 

325 


Portraits    of  the    Day 


MADEMOISELLE    SUZANNE 
BROHAN 

UNTIL  now  I  have  reviewed  only  a  certain 
number  of  figures  of  more  or  less  beautiful 
actresses,  more  or  less  suave  and  harmoni- 
ous in  their  contours;  I  have  been  preoccupied  with 
the  line  rather  than  with  the  expression;  I  have  en- 
deavoured to  draw  in  ink,  so  to  speak,  each  of  the 
beautiful  flowers  of  our  day.  In  this  gallery  of  lovely 
actresses  all  have  a  proud  look  and  a  bold  brow  ;  they 
walk  like  Venus  or  Aspasia;  they  have  the  same 
assured  feeling  of  triumph  in  their  port,  the  same 
grace,  the  same  smile.  They  recall  the  "  Procession 
of  the  Hours,"  in  which  all  the  figures  are  beautiful, 
and  in  which  each  goddess  wafts  her  own  perfume 
through  the  air. 

I  have  enjoyed  describing  all  these  figures  ;  in  some 
the  pure  severity  of  a  Greek  profile,  in  others  the 
lively  and  charming  ways  of  a  Watteau  shepherdess. 
Now  I  shall  open  the  gallery  of  clever  actresses. 

326 


MLLE.     SUZANNE    B  ROHAN 

They  cannot  complain  of  my  having  given  preced- 
ence to  those  flowers  of  a  day,  of  which  the  wind 
breaks  the  stalk;  it  is  to  be  feared  that  they  will 
know  neither  old  age  nor  duration. 

I  do  not  mean,  however,  that  all  clever  actresses 
are  not  beautiful;  only,  there  are  some  among  them 
in  whom  talent  makes  one  forget  even  the  beauty 
of  the  person,  just  as  the  main  motive  of  a  sym- 
phony casts  in  the  shade  all  its  other  merits.  I 
know  no  more  absolute  tyrant  than  talent.  See  for 
yourself.  Here,  even  in  society,  there  are  charming 
women  who  might  justly  be  thought  pretty,  even  by 
the  side  of  the  prettiest ;  they  have  a  bright  smile, 
white  teeth,  abundance  of  hair,  a  lovely  complexion, 
but  they  have  also,  unfortunately,  wit,  and  the  pitiless 
generosity  of  heaven  has  poured  out  so  many  gifts 
upon  them  that  ugly  women,  in  order  to  console 
themselves  for  that  fact,  seem  to  forget  every  mo- 
ment that  these  society  rivals  are  pretty  ;  they  merely 
say,  "  How  clever  they  are !  "  and  when  they  say 
that,  it  is  to  avenge  themselves. 

Cleverness  is  a  book  which  very  few  people  are 
capable  of  writing  or  of  understanding.  There  is 
more  wit  in  a  single  gesture  of  a  woman,  in  a  single 

327 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

shade  of  her  dress,  in  a  single  inflection  of  her  voice, 
than  in  all  "  Candide."  Add  to  this  that  wit  is  van- 
ishing and  becomes  rarer  every  day  on  the  stage  as 
in  society. 

Who  will  restore  to  us  those  divine  models  of  wit 
of  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries,  from 
Madame  de  Sevigne  to  Madame  de  Montesson  ? 
What  patient  analyst  will  take  pains  to  explain  to  us 
how,  little  by  little,  wit,  that  gem  so  rarely  met  with 
among  our  actresses,  passed  through  an  admirable 
exchange  of  grace  and  urbanity  from  the  drawing- 
room  of  the  court  lady  to  the  stage  ? 

Of  the  different  kinds  of  wit  which  an  actress  may 
possess,  the  rarest  is  unquestionably  society  wit,  yet 
it  is  that  very  form  which,  in  spite  of  prejudice, 
reconciled  the  French  society  which  has  just  come 
to  an  end  to  the  simplicity  of  Gaussin,  the  repartees 
of  Sophie  Arnould,  and  the  daring  of  Mademoiselle 
Mars.  These  ladies  had  won  the  right  to  say  any- 
thing they  pleased  by  dint  of  cleverness;  they  had 
enough  and  to  spare  for  all  those  small  memoirs  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  so  conceited  and  impudent. 
The  Cydalises  of  that  day  did  not  rely  upon  a  stock 
of  witticisms  borrowed  here  and  there,  from  the  stage 

3*8 


************************ 

MLLE.    SUZANNE    BROHAN 

or  the  foyer ;  they  had  their  own  genuine  wit.  The 
actresses  of  that  day  were  in  accord  with  the  upper 
ten;  the  two  powers  mutually  aided  each  other. 

To-day  where  is  the  actress  clever  enough  to  ven- 
ture, off  the  stage,  upon  that  dangerous  ground  of  wit, 
to  maintain  herself  on  it,  and  to  triumph  over  others  ? 
What  woman  is  always  so  much  mistress  of  herself 
as  to  keep  close  watch  on  herself  and  never  to  ex- 
aggerate ?  Besides,  when  a  woman  is  young  and 
beautiful,  she  is  not  likely  to  have  recourse  to  wit 
when  she  can  so  easily  appeal  to  her  charms.  There 
are  certain  sacrifices  which  are  quite  inexplicable. 
Just  as  young,  lovely  women  of  the  Court  of  the 
Great  King,  their  hair  still  adorned  with  pearls,  still 
scented  with  the  roses  of  Versailles  and  the  perfumed 
love-knots  of  scores  of  lovers,  betook  themselves  fear- 
fully to  the  solitude  of  the  cloister,  so  there  are  also 
actresses  whose  wavering  courage  leads  them  to  take 
refuge  in  wit  as  a  means  of  defence;  it  then  becomes  a 
weapon  with  which  they  guard  themselves  from  slander 
and  the  mean  jealousies  of  the  green-room;  it  becomes 
the  fan  with  which  they  slap  the  face  of  fools.  Made- 
moiselle de  PEtoile  in  the  "  Roman  comique  "  uses  her 
busk  in  that  way  when  she  wants  to  punish  Ragotin. 

329 


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PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

It  is  not  my  part  to  seek  to  explain  the  motives 
which  cause  a  pretty  actress  to  take  to  wit  for  the 
rest  of  her  days,  as  formerly  women  took  to  religion  j 
such  a  resolve  can  only  be  the  result  of  great  per- 
sonal merit,  and  besides,  to  aspire  to  reign  supreme 
as  a  wit  is  a  very  fine  ambition.  This  position,  un- 
occupied at  the  Comedie  Francaise  since  Mademoi- 
selle Contat,  is  sought  for  at  present  by  not  more 
than  three  or  four  serious  claimants.  At  their  head 
must  be  placed  Mademoiselle  Brohan. 

All  that  I  have  said  about  wit  applies  thoroughly 
to  the  nature  of  that  actress,  the  charming  Made- 
moiselle Brohan,  who  is  to  be  seen  walking  so 
seriously  along  the  street  and  towards  the  green- 
room of  her  theatre,  and  who  will  be  seen  presently 
on  the  stage  sparkling  with  wit,  humour,  and  charm. 
Every  word  of  hers  will  tell,  every  repartee  will  be 
piquant,  she  breathes  the  very  spirit  of  Marivaux's 
comedy,  she  flashes  and  sparkles  as  it  does.  On 
the  stage  Mademoiselle  Brohan  has  the  effect  of 
champagne  ;  one  has  not  time  to  see  the  defects  in 
the  work,  so  completely  is  one  dazzled  and  carried 
away.  The  mobility  of  her  features  adds  wonderful 
power  to  her  irony  or  her  passion  ;  as  swift  as  the 

330 


MLLE.    SUZANNE    BROHAN 

bee,  she  stings    before   we   have  thought   of  warding 
off  the  stroke. 

But  go  to  the  green-room  after  such  an  amusing 
evening,  and  you  find  there  the  most  amiable  woman 
of  the  world,  who  receives  you  with  the  air  of  a  high- 
bred lady,  with  the  reserve,  the  wit,  the  delicacy,  and 
the  dignity  of  manners  which  no  actress,  not  even 
Mademoiselle  Mars,  possesses  off  the  stage.  Grace- 
ful and  fine  as  one  of  Petitot's  enamels,  Mademoiselle 
Brohan's  face  could  very  well  do  without  wit,  but  she 
has  been  quite  right  to  turn  to  it,  even  as  a  matter 
of  policy,  for  wit  best  adorns  beauty. 


331 


Portraits  of  the    D  ay 


MADAME    DORVAL 

BORN  IN   1801  —  DIED  IN   1849 


PEOPLE  who  never  enter  theatres  are  thor- 
oughly convinced  that  authors  and  actors  of 
the  drama  properly  so  called  have  almost 
invariably  a  long  face,  a  sombre  look,  and  a  Catalan 
dagger  concealed  about  their  person.  These  worthy 
people  would  be  shocked  if  they  saw  traces  of  gaiety 
on  the  face  of  Alexandre  Dumas,  of  Bocage,  of  Victor 
Hugo,  or  of  Frederick  Lemaitre  ;  they  are  quite  sure 
that  Dumas  killed  a  number  of  sailors  on  his  trip  to 
Sicily,  that  Bocage  goes  every  morning  to  weep  in  the 
Vaugirard  Cemetery,  that  Victor  Hugo  inhabits  a 
cavern  not  far  from  Paris,  and  that  Frederick  Lemaitre 
has  tried  time  and  again  to  commit  suicide  under  the 
windows  of  a  Russian  princess. 

The  witty  and  joyous  dash  characteristic  of  Dumas' 
conversation,  the  quiet  and  paternal  gait  of  Victor 
Hugo,  Bocage  and  Frederick  Lemaitre  in  their  blue 
coats  playing  billiards  near  the  Ambigu,  would  fill  them 

332 


MADAME    DORVAL 


with  amazement.  Now  you  can  easily  imagine  what 
that  sort  of  people  think  of  actresses  who  perform  in 
dramas. 

At  the  head  of  these  is  naturally  Madame  Dorval. 
She  appears  to  them  in  the  light  of  a  veritable  victim  ; 
to  them  her  soft,  veiled  look  is  full  of  soulfulness  and 
elegiac  sadness.  "  I  am  sure,"  said  a  mirror-maker  to 
his  neighbour,  "that  that  woman  weeps  eight  hours  a 
day.  I  am  told  that  she  has  her  room  hung  with 
black  velvet.  She  goes  to  church,"  etc.,  etc. 

It  is  thus  that  the  ingenious  mirror-maker  judges 
that  great  actress,  because  he  has  seen  her  in  the  part 
of  Adele  in  "  Antony,"  in  "  The  Gamester's  Wife," 
in  "  Charlotte  Corday,"  and  especially  in  Marguerite 
in  Goethe's  "  Faust  "  ;  parts  which  Madame  Dorval 
has  marked  with  all  her  genius  for  suffering  and 
resigned  love.  Happily  the  bourgeois  and  the  mirror- 
maker  —  I  hope  so,  at  least,  for  the  sake  of  news- 
paper men  —  write  neither  biographies  nor  notices. 

Madame  Dorval  is  one  of  those  privileged  natures 
which  necessarily  are  not  understood  of  the  vulgar; 
she  scarce  shows  her  true  self  save  to  her  circle  of 
intimate  friends  and  to  the  authors  who  usually  write 
for  her.  Adele  in  "  Antony,"  whose  smile  is  so  sad 

333 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

and  tearful,  displays  in  her  own  home  all  the  treasures 
of  her  naturally  bright  and  joyous  disposition.  The 
real  characteristic  of  Madame  DorvaPs  temperament  is 
genuine,  open  gaiety,  as  bright  and  fresh  as  the  song 
of  the  bird  in  the  cornfield.  She  is  obliging  and  sets 
you  at  once  at  your  ease,  whoever  you  may  be,  which 
is  the  peculiarity  of  those  genuinely  rich  in  talent, 
noble  hearts  which  hold  out  their  hand  to  the  poorest. 
Madame  DorvaPs  conversation  is  never  fed  with  the 
wearisome  commonplaces  which  Voisenon  calls  "  good 
friends  which  never  fail  you  at  need " ;  on  the  con- 
trary she  willingly  indulges,  in  the  maddest  possible 
way,  in  absurdities  and  paradoxes,  enlivening  every- 
thing, quizzing  everything,  imprudently  expending  her- 
self in  a  thousand  ways,  and  not  understanding  the  art 
of  saving. 

Never  seeking  an  effect,  never  pretending  to  utter 
witticisms,  Madame  Dorval  does  so  nevertheless  with 
certainty;  all  her  rashest  witticisms  are  fortunate. 
The  peculiar  mark  of  her  wit  is  candour,  it  is  like 
the  bouquet  of  the  rarest  wines.  The  most  remark- 
able thing  about  Madame  Dorval  is  that  she  could 
assuredly  turn  that  wit  to  some  other  account.  I  have 
no  hesitation  in  saying  that  if  she  cared  to  write  a 

334 


MADAME    DORVAL 


book,  even  though  she  did  not  put  her  name  to  it,  the 
book  would  be  read. 

I  have  an  album  in  which  Madame  Dorval  has 
copied  a  few  thoughts  and  maxims  drawn  from  writers 
of  various  countries.  It  is  a  perfect  Babel.  The 
names  of  Schiller,  Victor  Hugo,  Jesus  Christ,  Ma- 
homet, Sainte-Beuve,  and  many  others  are  met  with 
there.  These  varied  extracts  are  the  result  of  her  read- 
ing, but  the  choice  of  them  marks  indescribable  fanci- 
fulness  and  humour.  The  reading  of  the  book,  written 
from  beginning  to  end  by  herself,  makes  you  feel  as  if 
you  were  following  out  one  of  Jordaens'  wonderful 
Bacchanals;  thoughts  alternate  with  stories,  poetry 
with  prose;  you  come  upon  sums  in  arithmetic  and 
astronomical  predictions,  all  whirling  in  a  fantastic 
spiral,  breaking  out  into  so  many  flashes,  which  seem 
to  light  up  the  road  travelled  by  Madame  Dorval. 

I  have  often  been  asked  by  people  in  the  provinces 
less  stupid  than  the  mirror-maker  I  have  spoken  of, 
"  Is  Madame  Dorval  witty  ?  "  My  reply  to  these 
people,  whom  I  could  not  decently  present  to  the 
charming  actress,  was,  "  Have  you  seen  her  in  '  Jeanne 
Vaubernier  '  by  Balissan  de  Rougemont  ?  "  For  that 
part  is  one  of  the  best  proofs  of  Madame  DorvaPs 

335 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

wit  i  she  plays  it  like  an  actress  who  puts  irony  and 
telling  effects  into  every  fold  of  her  fan.  M.  Balissan 
de  Rougemont  must  not  get  conceited  because  I  say 
this,  for  it  is  entirely  in  spite  of  him  that  Madame 
Dorval  has  displayed  such  cleverness  in  that  common- 
place story.  Actresses  sometimes  play  pleasant  tricks 
to  poor  authors,  —  a  trick  like  this  one  is  a  noble 
vengeance. 

In  order  that  this  article  may  not  fail  to  reassure 
people  who  insist  on  believing  that  Madame  Dorval 
inhabits  a  sepulchre,  I  am  glad  to  tell  them  that  her 
drawing-room  looks  like  an  annex  to  that  of  Marion 
Delorme.  It  is  furnished  with  all  the  comfort  and 
elegance  of  the  day :  albums,  paintings,  statues,  a 
piano,  flowers,  embroidery,  and  porcelains.  I  have 
not  seen  in  it  a  single  black  veil  nor  any  Borgia  poison, 
no  Toledo  blade  and  no  stiletto.  People  drink  tea,  sit 
on  comfortable  sofas,  talk  with  clever  people  and  allow 
themselves  to  laugh  at  certain  actresses  —  and  you 
rarely  meet  any  actors  there. 


336 


Portraits    of  the    Day 


MADEMOISELLE    RACHEL 

BORN  IN  1820  —  DIED  IN   1858 

I  HAVE  no  intention  of  writing  a  biography  of 
Mademoiselle  Rachel.  The  vulgar  curiosity 
which  hungers  after  insignificant  details  disgusts 
me  more  than  I  can  express."  But  I  may,  I  believe, 
without  lacking  in  propriety,  indicate  a  few  features  of 
the  general  appearance  of  the  illustrious  tragedian 
whose  name  may  almost  be  replaced  by  this  periphrasis. 
Mademoiselle  Rachel,  though  devoid  of  plastic 
knowledge  or  taste,  possessed  an  instinctive  and  deep 
feeling  for  statuary.  Her  poses,  her  attitudes,  her 
gestures  were  naturally  statuesque  and  formed  a  series 
of  bassi-relievi  ;  the  draperies  fell  on  her  tall,  elegant, 
supple  body  in  folds  that  might  have  been  made  by  the 
hand  of  Phidias  ;  no  modern  movement  broke  the  har- 
mony and  the  rhythm  of  her  walk  ;  she  was  born  an 
antique,  and  her  pale  flesh  seemed  made  of  Greek 
marble.  Her  beauty,  unrecognised,  —  she  was  an 
admirably  beautiful  woman,  —  had  nothing  coquettish, 

337 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

or  pretty,  nothing  French,  in  a  word.  Indeed,  for  a 
long  time  she  was  considered  ugly,  while  artists  were 
lovingly  studying  and  reproducing  as  a  type  of  perfec- 
tion her  face  with  its  black  eyes,  which  was  the  very 
image  of  the  face  of  Melpomene.  Her  brow  was 
meant  for  the  golden  circlet  or  white  band,  her  glance 
was  deep  and  fatal,  her  face  was  an  exquisite,  long 
oval,  her  lips  were  disdainfully  drawn  up  at  the  ends, 
her  neck  was  superbly  joined  to  her  shoulders.  When 
she  appeared,  in  spite  of  the  arm-chairs,  and  the  Co- 
rinthian colonnades  supporting  a  vault  with  rose  orna- 
ments, while  the  age  was  that  of  heroic  Greece,  in 
spite  of  too  frequent  anachronisms  in  the  language,  she 
at  once  carried  you  back  to  the  purest  antiquity.  It 
was  the  Phaedra  of  Euripides,  not  that  of  Racine,  which 
you  beheld.  She  turned  herself  swiftly,  with  a  few 
easy,  bold,  simple  touches  comparable  to  those  of  the 
painters  of  Greek  vases,  into  a  long,  draped  figure  with 
few  ornaments,  graceful  in  its  austerity  and  archaic  in 
its  charm,  which  it  was  impossible  thereafter  to  forget. 
I  would  in  no  wise  take  aught  from  her  glory,  but  in 
this  lay  the  originality  of  her  talent.  Mademoiselle 
Rachel  was  rather  a  tragic  mime  than  a  tragedian  in 
the  ordinary  sense  of  the  word.  Her  success,  which 

338 


MADEMOISELLE    RACHEL 

was  so  great  with  us,  would  have  been  greater  still  on 
the  theatre  of  Bacchus  at  Athens  if  the  Greeks  had 
allowed  women  to  wear  the  cothurn.  Not  that  she 
gesticulated,  for  on  the  contrary  motionlessness  was  one 
of  her  most  telling  means  of  impressing  her  audiences, 
but  she  realised  in  her  appearance  all  the  ideal  queens, 
heroines,  and  victims  of  antiquity  which  the  spectator 
could  imagine.  By  a  simple  fold  of  her  cloak  she 
often  told  more  than  the  author  in  a  long  tirade,  and 
with  a  single  gesture  she  called  back  to  the  fabulous 
and  mythological  times  Tragedy,  which  was  forgetting 
itself  in  Versailles. 

She  alone  maintained  alive  for  eighteen  years  a  dead 
form,  not  by  renewing  it,  as  might  be  supposed,  but  by 
making  it  antique  instead  of  old-fashioned,  which  per- 
chance it  had  become.  Her  grave,  deep,  vibrating 
voice,  so  seldom  rising  loud  or  breaking  into  cries,  well 
suited  her  self-contained,  sovereignly  calm  acting. 
Never  did  any  one  have  less  recourse  to  the  epileptic 
contorsions,  to  the  convulsive  or  hoarse  cries  of  the 
melodrama,  or  of  the  drama,  if  you  prefer  that.  In- 
deed, she  was  occasionally  accused  of  lacking  feeling,  a 
most  idiotic  reproach.  Mademoiselle  Rachel  was  cold 
like  antiquity,  which  considered  the  exaggerated  mani- 

339 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

festations  of  grief  indecent,  and  scarcely  allowed 
Laocoon  to  writhe  as  the  serpent  wound  around  him, 
and  Niobe  to  crouch  under  the  arrows  of  Apollo  and 
Diana.  The  heroic  world  was  calm,  robust,  and 
manly  ;  it  would  have  feared  to  tarnish  its  beauty  by 
grimaces ;  and  besides,  our  nervous  suffering,  our 
puerile  despair,  our  sentimental  excitement  would 
have  made  no  impression  upon  those  marble  natures, 
on  those  sculptural  personalities  which  Fate  alone 
could  break  after  a  long  struggle.  The  tragic  heroes 
were  almost  the  equals  of  the  gods  from  whom  they 
were  often  descended,  and  they  rebelled  against  Fate 
rather  than  whimpered.  So  Mademoiselle  Rachel  was 
right  not  to  use  the  tearful  voice,  and  not  to  speak 
the  alexandrine  verse  tremulously  and  haltingly  as 
modern  sensitive  players  do.  Hatred,  wrath,  ven- 
geance, revolt  against  Fate,  passion  terrible  and  fierce, 
love  with  its  implacable  fury,  murderous  irony,  haughty 
despair,  fatal  madness,  these  are  the  sentiments  which 
tragedy  can  and  must  express;  but  it  must  express 
them  like  marble  bassi-relievi  on  the  walls  of  a  palace 
or  a  temple,  without  breaking  the  lines  of  the  sculpture, 
and  constantly  preserving  the  eternal  serenity  of  art. 
No  actress  has  rendered  so  well  as  Mademoiselle 

340 


MADEMOISELLE    RACHEL 

Rachel  the  synthetic  expression  of  human  passion  in- 
carnated in  tragedy  under  the  figure  of  gods,  heroes, 
kings,  princes,  and  princesses,  as  if  it  were  intended 
to  remove  them  farther  from  vulgar  reality  and  mean, 
prosaic  details.  She  was  simple,  beautiful,  grand,  and 
virile  like  Greek  art,  which  she  represented  in  French 
tragedy. 

Dramatic  authors,  on  seeing  the  immense  success 
of  her  performances,  often  longed  to  secure  her  as 
the  interpreter  of  their  works.  If  she  occasionally 
yielded  to  such  requests,  it  was,  I  may  affirm  it,  only 
regretfully  and  after  much  hesitation.  Although  she 
was  reproached  with  doing  nothing  for  the  art  of  our 
day,  her  tact,  so  deep  and  so  sure,  made  her  feel  that 
she  was  not  a  modern,  and  that  if  she  played  the  parts 
offered  to  her  on  all  sides  she  would  destroy  the  pure 
and  antique  lines  of  her  talent.  She  preserved  her  life 
long  her  statuesque  attitude  and  her  marble  whiteness. 
The  few  plays  outside  of  her  old  repertoire  in  which 
she  performed  are  not  to  be  taken  into  account,  for 
she  abandoned  them  as  speedily  as  she  could.  So  she 
had  no  influence  upon  our  contemporary  art,  but  on 
the  other  hand,  she  was  not  influenced  by  it.  She 
stands  apart,  isolated  on  her  pedestal  in  the  midst  of 

341 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

the  thymele ;  around  it  the  choruses  and  semi-choruses 
of  tragedy  ever  weave  in  and  out  according  to  the 
ancient  rhythm.  There  she  may  be  left,  as  the  most 
suitable  funeral  figure  upon  the  tomb  of  Tragedy. 

We  have  said  that  Mademoiselle  Rachel  had  no 
influence  whatever  on  contemporary  literature,  but 
that  is  too  strong  a  statement.  She  certainly  did  not 
take  any  part  in  it,  but  by  resuscitating  our  old-time 
tragedy,  she  checked  the  great  Romanticist  movement 
which  might  perhaps  have  given  to  France  a  new 
dramatic  form ;  she  drove  to  inferior  stages  more  than 
one  discouraged  talent ;  but  on  the  other  hand  by  her 
beauty  and  her  genius  she  made  the  ideal  of  antiquity 
live  again,  and  made  us  dream  of  an  art  greater  than 
that  of  which  she  was  the  interpreter. 

In  private  life  Mademoiselle  Rachel  did  not,  like 
so  many  actresses,  destroy  the  illusion  she  had  pro- 
duced on  the  stage  ;  on  the  contrary,  she  preserved 
all  her  prestige.  No  one  was  more  simply  a  great 
lady.  The  statue  had  no  difficulty  in  turning  into  a 
duchess,  and  she  wore  the  long  cashmere  just  as  she 
wore  the  purple  mantle  with  its  golden  palms.  Her 
small  hands,  scarce  large  enough  to  hold  the  dagger 
of  tragedy,  handled  a  fan  like  a  queen.  When  one 

342 


MADEMOISELLE    RACHEL 

saw  her  close,  the  delicate  details  of  her  charming  face 
were  seen  in  her  cameo-like  profile  within  the  corolla 
of  the  bonnet,  as  they  lighted  up  with  a  witty  smile. 
She  never  posed,  she  was  never  tense,  she  often  ex- 
hibited a  playfulness  unexpected  on  the  part  of  a 
tragic  queen.  Many  a  clever  remark,  many  an  in- 
genious repartee,  many  a  witty  saying  has  fallen  from 
those  beautiful  lips  shaped  like  Cupid's  bow  and  now 
mute  forever. 

An  actor's  fate,  after  all,  is  very  sad  ;  he  cannot 
say,  like  the  poet,  non  omnis  moriar ;  his  past  work 
does  not  remain,  and  all  his  glory  goes  down  into 
the  grave  with  him.  His  name  alone  is  repeated 
for  a  time  by  men.  Among  the  present  generation, 
who  is  there  that  has  a  very  clear  idea  of  Talma, 
Malibran,  Mademoiselle  Mars,  Madame  Dorval  ? 
What  young  man  is  there  who  does  not  smile  at 
the  amazing  tales  told  by  some  old  amateur  still 
passionately  fond  of  his  remembrances ;  and  who  does 
not  prefer  in  petto  some  blooming,  living  mediocrity 
performing  in  an  ephemeral  work  of  the  day  under 
the  glare  of  the  footlights  ? 

So  let  us  not,  we  patient  sculptors  of  that  hard 
marble  called  verse,  envy,  in  our  wretchedness  and 

343 


PORTRAITS    OF    THE    DAY 

solitude,  the  noise,  the  applause,  the  praise,  the  crowns, 
the  showers  of  gold  and  flowers,  the  carriages  with 
the  horses  taken  out,  the  torchlight  serenades,  or  even 
after  death  the  immense  processions  which  seem  to 
have  gathered  together  the  inhabitants  of  a  state. 
Poor  beautiful  actresses  !  poor  great  queens !  For- 
getfulness  covers  them  completely,  and  the  curtain 
of  their  last  performance,  as  it  falls,  conceals  them 
forever.  Oh,  vanished  perfumes!  Oh,  songs  long 
stilled!  Oh,  passing  images!  Glory  knows  that  they 
will  not  live,  and  gives  them  forthwith  the  favours 
which  it  makes  immortal  poets  wait  for  so  long. 


344 


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